Reptile & Amphibian Forums

My 9 year old beardie basically hasn't eaten anything for the past month. We offer him various veggies and fruits every day and crickets every three days (his usual feeding pattern), but he isn't interested. Last Wednesday we finally tried a pinkie, which he ate after some cajoling. Since then, he is again not interested in eating. He pooped a few days before eating the pinkie (not sure how, since he hadn't eaten in weeks), but hasn't since.

He is pretty lazy in general, but recently even more so - he probably wouldn't come out from under his stick if we didn't pick him up and move him. He has gone through similar periods in the past, but never for this long.

We have tried soaking him in warm water (every other day for the past week), but it hasn't seemed to help. Temps in his basking spot are ~100-110, and ~80-90 on the cool side.

Any advice?

My best suggestion is to buy a weigh scale. Beardies can go for months without eating with minimal or no weight loss. If he doesn't eat and isn't losing weight then there's nothing to worry about.

Is he drinking water at least? Does he look sick? A picture would help.

I have dragons that have stopped eating in preparation for brumation. In captivity the annual cycle is less than 12 months. I had dragons start brumation in August last year, so brumations starting this month is not unusual at my house.

He's never drank, actually - we just spray his greens (and sometimes head/body) with water everyday.

We are still spraying him with water and soaking him, but I haven't seen him drink.

We will definitely weigh him, and I can post a picture later tonight.

Thanks!

being a dragon quite along in years...he is bound to start slowing down eating in general and in activity. It wouldn't hurt to bring him to the vet for a look over.

Also, check your cage setup too. Your basking temps, ambient temps, both day and night. If you have central air and its been on more lately due to being summer, it could be cooling down his cage more than you realize. Hence why he tends to get slow and acting like he wants to brumate. Take him outside for natural sunlight on a warm day (just make sure he has access to shade and don't leave him alone. I find its best to put him in a all screen enclosure outside or just a good sized rubbermaid container with a hide or a lid covering half the top to provide shade. A half hour in morning (7-10am) or late afternoon/early evening (4pm-7pm)works good.

Old Adult dragons in general don't eat as much, nor need to eat as much as fast growing and breeding younger dragons. Also he could simply be really bored with crickets too and the usual salads you make (don't' know if you rotate among the same staples and add different greens to them regularly, or pretty much use the same couple greens and vegetables consistently). Changing the diet but adding some new things (no pinkies or wax worms) such as dandelion greens and flowers (if you collect from outside, make sure they couldn't have come in contact with pesticides or herbicides), clover, hibiscus flowers and other edible flowers (just a few pieces of one or the other ontop of your regular salad works), try offering supperworms, silkworms, butterworms or hornworms instead of crickets...

Monitoring his weight will be beneficial as well.
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PHLdyPayne