Reptile & Amphibian Forums

My 6-month old Beardie has a bit of loose stool lately (maybe a week, not more). He is still very active when i take him out and seems contented to be held and petted. Good appetite for crickets but he seems less interested in his greens than before. He used to have greens in the evening and crickets during the day.

The only change right now is he is going through a shed, and he has been eating exclusively crickets. He shed part of his tail w/ more to go and his head is still ashy and I see him scratching.

No blood in the stool just very loose and nothing more unusual than some pre-shed lethargy.

I was wondering if anyone might have some suggestions for me. With work I will not be able to get a sample to the vet until Saturday. I'll try offering him some fresh collard greens tomorrow morning instead of crickets when he's awake and alert.

Many thanks.

This is the best time of year to get a fecal done anyway just in case he brumates. I wouldn't be that stressed about it as it may just be that there is more moisture in his food lately and may clear up in a couple days. I'd just make sure that his basking spot temp. is as warm as it should be since the temp. in your home is going down maybe his basking temp. is too.

Thank you. I had a fecal done in August and the vet found some coccida but nothing else. He said that is very common in dragons and research could show some day that they natively have a benign form of it in the gut. I gave him a medicine for 10 days (i don't remember the name, it smells like butterscotch) and I do admit I should have sent a follow up sample the first week of Sept but I got side-tracked. He did not have any bowel problems during or just after the medicine and I always gave it w/ food. I squirted it on a leaf and he ate it up.

He does have his basking spot and I also added a second ceramic heater when the weather changed here in NY to compensate and at night there is a towel over most of the exposed parts of the mesh lid to keep more heat in. He's in a 40gal right now and soon will be moved to a 125gal. There is also a small untertank heat pad that he always rests on after meals.

You really shouldn't use an under tank heater. I'd get rid of it if I were you. You also should let his environment cool to about 70 at night. 65 - 70 is fine. I live in NJ and am not supplying any night time heat yet even though temps in my house have dropped into the 60's at night recently.

I also don't believe in CHE's. If you are going to provide heat you should provide the light that goes along with it. Bright lighting for reptiles is important and encourages activity and appetite.

With light bulbs you can just change to different wattages as the seasons change.

He uses the CHE along with a ZooMed basking spot heat lamp and a UVB fluorescent both of which are on 12 hrs a day (approx). I can assure you his tank is bright and we have a 48" hood for lighting the new bigger one.

I have been concerned about letting him get too cold at night so starting when the weather changed I have been putting on the CHE on at night over him when he sleeps.

This morning I tricked him into eating some greens by pouring crickets onto a bed of shredded collard greens. I tried offering them directly and he was very stubborn.

Why do you not like undertank heaters? He seems happy to lay on it in the mornings after he eats then he moves to the basking light on the other side of the tank.

I called home, no poopie so far today. I'll keep you posted

Undertank heaters are generally for snakes and burrowing animals that live in areas where the substrate is warm. Bearded dragons in the wild bask in the sunlight for warmth and burrow into the ground to escape the heat and cool themselves. If he lays on the undertank heater and not in the warmest part of the basking light then most likely your basking spot is not warm enough.

Cool temps. are necessary at night to slow a reptiles metabolism down so that he sleeps properly. In cold blooded animals the warmer they are the faster their metabolism works. Also warmer temps have a tendancy to cause dehydration. This could be a part of your loose stool problem if it coinsides with the changes you made based on the weather.

Most importantly I would get an accurate digital thermometer and measure your temps. At night I would shoot for about 68-72 no higher. If you need a CHE to keep it from falling significantly below that range then that's OK. Some people think that a BD wants to be warm all the time but it's not correct. Arid regions in nature generally have a wide temperature swing from daytime to nightime.

The basking spot should be 105-110, this is a surface temp. The ambient (air temp.) on the warm side should be 87-92. the cool side ambient should be 75, or lower if a very large enclosure. You can think of the basking spot as walking on a road in bare feet in the sun when it's 87-92 out.

That's funny! We posted at the same time. Josh

Hi, your dragon may be getting too hot which can cause runny stools. With high temps, the dragons metabolism is sped up to the point to where he/she may not be fully digesting the food. It's good for dragons to have cool nights as long as the temps don't go down below 55-60 degrees. This way the dragon doesn't dehydrate/lose weight while it is sleeping. Josh

Everything you both describe is what he is going through. This change in sleeping spot and the runny stool started after I added the CHE to his night time. I did a lot of research on BDs before I got him and I knew all the wisdom said that low temps are night are correct but I figured "I knew best".

Tonight he is sleeping au naturel and I am sure it will take a few days for him to get his groove back. I noticed something amiss when he started sleeping under his basking bridge and under the paper substrate. He never wanted a hide box even as a hatchling, he would sit on it or ignore it and liked to sleep on his branch so I knew something was up and I thought he was cold, not hot.

I really can't thank you both, Josh and BD, enough for putting me on the right track. I will definitely post an update on Bailey by the weekend. This picture is of him at age 5mo - he is about 7mo now.

No problem! Josh