Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I'm very confused. We already took him to the vet, and they've taken some blood to make sure there's nothing really wrong with him inside (like kidney failure). If there is, hopefully they'll be able to catch it early. So basically, here's what's been going on:

We took Sid to the vet wednesday because he hadn't gone to the bathroom in about 2-3 weeks again, and he was now becoming lethargic and losing his appetite. Our vet (who is apparently pretty much the best around here) checked for impaction, which basically looked like he was giving sid a stomach massage. He said that to his surprise, sid's intestines weren't bloated or in any way indicating impaction, and he looked very healthy (he was actually active at the vet's). So they took some blood and we'll know if there's something wrong this week.

But one thing I was thinking was that sidney was starting to brumate. Our vet didn't think he was yet, because it's still early, and he also said that a lot of times dragons aren't too affected by the weather changes if you keep their cage temps and lights at the same settings. So he told me to start getting food into him, even if it meant force feeding (because he hadn't eaten in almost a week). What do you think is going on with sid? I thought parasites, but he just went to the bathroom (we would have brought in a fecal, but the vet was closed), and it looked relatively healthy. It was in the standard long, solid form and everything, though there was still a little excess liquid (not much, just enough to soak through his paper towels).

So I force fed him wednesday, thursday, and then yesterday, he bit off the end of the cue-tip I was using and ate it (it didn't have the cotten on it). I'm not too worried about it, since it is one of the ones that's made out of like basically paper, but should I worry about it?

Jeez, I wish he would just be healthy for once.

So, is there any other way besides force feeding to get him to start eating?

I'm sure I'll have more questions later.

I think the weather changes (causing his tank to be a little less hot), and forgetting to feed him one day (I usually fed him everyother day, so it was 2 days without food when I missed a day) are what caused it. Today I turned up his temps a little (back to 105-110 degrees), put an extra light over the tank to make it brighter, and fed him again, as I have been trying to get him to eat everyday all week. He was active, playful, and he just ate 16 crickets. I think he was just jumping the gun a little with the brumating.

I also put the carpet back in his tank (he was on paper towels for a while) and I'm trying the little trick where you leave a folded up paper towel in. hopefully next time he poos (which will hopefully be tomorrow) he'll use the paper towel, and continue to.

i think things are looking up. tomorrow I'm going to call the vet to see what showed up in the blood (would parasites show in blood work) to make sure nothing's wrong). I'm hoping and praying that he will finally be a healthy lizard! Hopefully he'll start growing more, since he's only 16" right now, probably because of all the parasites he went through. I'm not exactly sure of the age, but we bought him just about this time last year (a couple weeks earlier) and since he didn't go into brumation last year, I'll assume he was 6-9 monthes old (he was also 12"-13" in length then). So now I'm going to fatten him up so he's ready for brumation, and hopefully that'll help him grow lengthwise and width wise, as well as inducing shedding which he hasn't done since spring/summer. I also want to try to get him a bigger home before brumation (a 75 gallon, instead of my 40 breeder), and a better hiding spot.

I'm excited that he's doing better.

later