Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I've had my savanna monitor for the past year. Recently, I noticed that the fat stores in her tail have gone down. She acts the same as ever; lazy, but eats anything given to her. I know she moves around a little bit, mostly once I've left the room. Other than her incredably skinny tail, she seems to be doing fine. I've given her a bit of canned cat food to see if I can get her tail to bulk up a bit. Any other suggestions to make her tail nice and fat again? I really will start worrying if it gets any smaller.

Take a fecal sample to the vet to check for internal parasites. Nearly any vet should be able to do this, it's quite routine. It's my understanding that almost all savs are wc/ch and have parasite problems, which can take a while to show up. A bit of medicine might get the lizard back on the right road very quickly. In the meantime, I'd feed rodents or maybe supplemented ground turkey instead of cat food.

>>Take a fecal sample to the vet to check for internal parasites. Nearly any vet should be able to do this, it's quite routine. It's my understanding that almost all savs are wc/ch and have parasite problems, which can take a while to show up. A bit of medicine might get the lizard back on the right road very quickly. In the meantime, I'd feed rodents or maybe supplemented ground turkey instead of cat food.
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I have two more questions.
One being, although her tail has become a bit skinny, her belly is good full size, and the rest of her seems to be in healthy condition too. Still internal parasites?
And my second question is, for me to take a fecal sample to the vet, I need a fecal sample. When she does defecate, she uses her water dish. How can I get a sample when its always in her water?

Thanks

The vet can get a sample from her. I assume that savannahs are similar to other monitors in that they crap when freightened; she'll crap when they pick her up.

Otherwise, you can try using her regular water container, get her in it, and mist her with a pump spray. That one works for me with certain lizards.

Roger

They can actually do some sort of cloacal wash, they did this for my bearded dragon, and I guess it worked. Internal parasites can cause a whole range of symptoms, and if the animal is eating but not putting on weight, that's the first thing to look at.

i fed him really good (more then normal) for 2 days on the third say i didn;t put any water in his tub. when i got home from work he had gone in the tub anyway. its just an idea and it worked for me.