Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hi I have a 1 1/2 yr. old female dragon that has blood in her stool. She is in a custom made cage I made her with ceramic tile on the bottom. She has the proper heating and uvb setup. She eats greens in the morning and has crickets for lunch and dinner. She eats hornworms once a week. Our vet that we use is on vacation and won't be back for a week. Does anyone know what could be wrong with her.
" alt="Image">

1. Could be parasitic
2. Could be from not eating enough (not saying your not offering it enough food, but it may not be eating for some reason) acid's could irritate the digestive tract and result in hemmoraging.
3. Could be bacterial related.

Make sure you are offering enough water everyday to avoid dehydration. "You may want to have "Repti-Aid" on hand.

Diarrhea can cause calcium and fluid loss, so watch for that as well.

***** I am not a medical specialist, just have plenty of experience with Bearded Dragons.

-------------- SEE A VET PROFESSIONAL --------------------

blood in stool can be the result of many things...and it may not even be real blood. Have you fed anything 'red' to your dragon lately? Natural red food dyes found in colored pellets (though you didn't mention feeding any pellets) or red flower petals, peppers, strawberries and other red fruits...can turn the stool red and in combination with the usual 'brown' of stool, can look like blood.

If the stool is very hard, constipation could have caused a tear which bled. Parasites can also cause bleeding if they have a heavy load of parasites. If constipated, you need to get more fluids in your dragons. Normal dragon poop should be formed but not hard to 'squish' when you pick it up in papertowels to throw out. The white part, the urate, is typically much more firmer but can have a jelly like consistency. Also, if your dragon is well hydrated, should be a good amount of fluid expelled along with the stool.

If its alot of blood then I would take your dragon to a vet immediately, regular or not. If she's really bleeding out of her vent even between bowel movements, this indicates a tear which could cause her to bleed to death or get infected. If just a small trace of blood...you can wait till your regular vet returns (as long as he's back and you can get in to see him within a week) and take a fresh stool sample to him, to check for parasites.

Have you been breeding your dragon? Sometimes copulation can cause a little blood in the stool though this usually should only happen in the one stool sample unless you are keeping them together so there are multiple copulations spread over many days. Even then, I would separate her from the male and see if there is more trace amounts of blood in her next stool.
-----
PHLdyPayne

Thanks for the info. She really doesn't have much of an appetite. She wouldn't even eat a hornworm for me today and they are her favorites. Her food doesn't have any red dye in it. I called my vets office and they said I can bring in a stool sample in on Monday and they can send it out get tested. Then they will notify me a couple of days later with the results. I was trying not to wait that long but there is no other vet around me that deals with reptiles. I saw parasite medicine online but wasn't sure if i should use any of that stuff.

Is her vent clean at the moment? If there isn't any sign of blood leaking around her vent, it may just be due to parasites. Kind of surprised the other vet can't do a simple fecal float there, unless they don't have any equipment to do any sort of lab work. Even a strictly cat/dog vet can do a fecal float for parasites.
-----
PHLdyPayne

She doesn't have any blood around her vent. She ate today and drank a lot of water when she had her bath. I thought I could bring in a sample and they could do the test there and tell me the results but they said it has to be sent out to a lab. They are mainly a cat/dog vet. They have 1 vet that has reptile experience.

Better to send the sample to the lab. Floats only test for specific parasites, generally coccidia and pinworms and you are at the mercy of the skill of the person using the microscope. I do my own floats here. Is she with a male?? I'm real skeptical about the parasites. So her stool is red like fresh blood? A picture of the dragon and stool could be helpful. How old is she?

Here is a pic of her and her poop,her and her cage. Today it is runny with a blood streak in it. I called my vet and she won't be back until friday. I found another vet further away that i am taking her to tomorrow morning. She ate 2 small hornworms last night and vomit those up today. She has lost 18 grams since i weighed her on feb.26. Hopefully the vet I take her to tomorrow can give me some answers. She has always been healthy.
Link

I finally figured out how to add these pictures. The first is kinda nasty but BDLVR its the pic of the poop and the blood streak. I went to take her in today and they said our vet wont be back until friday. I called a few places and we're headed to a place in elmwood but who knows. I'm basically going off of their recommendation. If anyone knows of a good reptile bearded dragon vet in the area of chicago please let me know. she is a smaller dragon. She currently weighs 276 grams. shes lost 12 grams since last month, which isn't all that much but i don't want her to get any worse.

That's real strange. The blood has to be right at the exit for it to have a streak like that. Mpost likely the vet will be able to see the injury with examination. From the pic she looks pretty healthy. Hornworms are mostly water, this is most likely the reason for the very loose stool. Since she regurgitated the last ones I would strongly recomend against feeding her hornworms for right now. I lost a female dragon last year that I feel was caused by hornworms. It's way better to be safe. Sometimes dragons regurgitate because what they ate was bad. I had another die 6 months earlier and the last thing he did was regurgitate a hornworm.

are her past few stools since you noticed the blood that watery? Hornworms wouldn't cause blood in the stool or any other issues, unless they are wild caught (and thus toxic).

I do agree having the blood in the center like that indicates the blooding is near the exit of her bowels, so it could have been a tear caused by mating (if she's been bred), a previously hard poop or exoskeleton may have caught on the way out.

Definitely take as much as that stool as you can to the vet with you tomorrow and see what they can find.

Before you noticed the first bowel movement with blood, what was her diet then? She does look a little slim in the photos but at least looks alert. I expect the greyish look of her scale is more due to her going into shed, than an indication of what the problem is as well.
-----
PHLdyPayne