Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I just got three timor monitors about two weeks ago. Two are male and one is female. I have only gotten one male to eat so far, and that was only about four grams of beef. They are ignoring crickets, pinkies, eggs, and beef. I've even tried dog food, but nothing's working. The vet told me to put some food in their mouth, but I can't do it with just two hands and suddenly I'm short of people willing to hold a lizard while I feed it.
The animals are all quarantined right now and being treated for ticks with Ivermectin spray. I keep them in a warm room with ambient temperatures in the low 80sF and they all have clean water. I'm at my wits end, so any help you can give me would be great! Thanks

New wild caughts? I have heard that sometimes they can be difficult...the ticks may have a big responsibility for lack of eating also dehydration could be playing a role...When u say quarantined...does that mean they are together quar. or each seperated quar.

I personally would seperate all, give each a nice hot basking spot(110 and higher but don't use a heat lamp to get these temps, there are better and safer ways)

Lots of climbing branches, lots of hide spots, keep several crickets in there, KEEP THE HUMIDITY NO LOWER THAN 60%, DON'T HANDLE THEM and try to leave them alone as much as possible, that includes walking or standing around them....check on them of course but move slow and try not to do it often....You also may consider soaking each one in warm water...maybe 80-85 degrees for long period and maybe (hopefully) u can kill some mites or ticks and hydrate at the same time...don't let the water temp drop though.

I keep blue spots...but the only two that i have that are wild caught have been captive for two yrs...so I don't have experience with new captives, but i am sure others will come and give so some better advice.

josh

a couple of disagreements...

1)You suggest not using a spot lamp to create a basking spot? How do you recommend achieving a hot enough temp. Keep in mind, monitors are baskers, and benefit from top-heat, not belly heat. Just wasn't sure what you were suggesting there-which method, I mean...

2)You say to throw crickets in there.. I have found, especially in the first few weeks/months, while the animals are still quite nervous and unfamiliar with their surroundings, and stressed out, that having crickets in there, crawling all over them, adds to the stress of the animals. I have found that initially, offering dead prey- ie. mice/rat pups, etc.., or live insects contained inside a bowl or container works much better, than allowing the crickets to have free range of the cage.. As I am sure all of us have seen crickets sitting atop an unhungry lizard, when they are just dumped into the cage... This adds to the overall stress of the animal, and it is very unlikely that they will come around and start eating them, if they are just bugging them(no pun intended).

3)About soaking the animal. While soaking the animal may help encourage the animal to start drinking, and it may help shed some of the ecto parasites, the temperatures you recommend are far too low.... Keep in mind that monitors at most times prefer to keep their body temps up near 100 ...

Think about it like this: As humans, we are endotherms, and can regualte our own temperatures... We go swimming in a 80-85F pool in the summer time to cool down... These temps are too low to allow a monitor that you are trying to nurse back to health sit in for a prolonged amount of time. I would aim to have his bath set at around 100F. You must also keep in mind that these baths cannot be long in duration, as water cools off rather quickly, especially smaller volumes and that of which is exposed to air temperatures... A nice, warm 100F bath will quickly turn to a 72F bath within a short amount of time... kind of like if you sat in your bathtub for several hours... you would eventually be freezing... Think about a reptile, who cannot regulate his temps... that water will be pretty damn cold for it... and will only weaken its immune system...

I only give baths/soaks if the animal in question is not drinking volountarily when misted/sprayed. I have found that warm brief soaks sometimes encourages a dehydrated animal to start drinking again.. Other than that, I try to avoid it...

Cheers,

Bob

Yeah my fault, I was just throwing out some generalizations...however I did mention no lower than 110 basking spot...just assumed that "basking", one could assume that meant a light, common sense would also mean a spot light for a concentrated beam in order to reach those temps...but it was rather generalized...

I see what you are saying about the crickets...dead would be alot better than alive on a newly transitioned animal...thanks, I will keep that in mind in the future...also to just add a side note to the water, I really meant to say not to let the water drop below 80, when i reread it after reading ur post I realised that it does sound like a low temp...but also I was thinking that 100 would be alittle too hot...my thinking was trying to imagine in nature that if the actual water temp would be as high as 100 in standing pools...but I guess it is possible...Purpose for that post was just to try to give him a few ideas to get started with because it was late and wasn't sure if more qualified persons such as urself would respond that late...as I am no expert...thanks though for giving myself some more pointers as well...I like your website btw, very imformative.

josh

Also, When swimming in summer time, I prefer water to be 65-70 in order to cool off, 80-85 is alittle to warm for my liking...lol

it looks like you may have bitten off more than you can chew. there is a reason why people recommend buying cb monitors from reliable breeders. unless you are very experienced in dealing with w/c's they will often cost you more in the long run than if you would have spent the extra money on a cbb and will never be of the same temperment as a baby that you raised yourself. I do deal with wc's and have good luck with them but #1 i have a realiable source that does not ship me sickly animals and #2 I have some experience in properly acclimating/treating them.

As you said you had taken them to a vet, i am assuming that he has done a fecal on them since if they have ticks they are more than likely loaded with parasites. This is something that needs to be done and more than once to ensure the treatment the vet prescribes is effective. For parasites with direct life cycles, cage hygiene is a must to prevent recurring problems. As they like to use a water bowl as a toilet, this means numerous water changes daily.

When you say ivermectin i hope you are not referring to injections. I have used ivermectin as a treatment for MITES but only as a diluted external spray. I find injections to be too dangerous as proper dosage is critical and there are more effective ways to treat mites. Ticks can simply be picked off and the area cleaned with a betadine solution.

I am new to this forum but already understand a point that someone made about how people come to this forum AFTER they have purchased a problem animal looking for a miracle.
Point taken FR.

Anyway, hopefully you will take responsibility for your actions and seek out a reliable vet and hopefully others on the forum can give some additional advice for the sake of the monitors. In your case however, a vet is what is most highly recommended. You should also have done your homework BEFORE buying the monitors BUT if for some reason you have not, you need to go through previous posts and ensure your enclosure is properly set up with the correct heat range and so forth.

good luck and perhaps others will learn from your mistake (wc vs. cb) I remember seeing it on another forum and i may misquote it but it applies here:
- an ignorrant man does not learn from his mistakes
- a smart man learns from his mistakes
- a wise man learns from the mistakes of others

I know i screwed it up but you get the point. CB.CB.CB.CB.CB

Hi there, below is a link to some articles I wrote for treemonitors.com regarding the acclimation process of wild caught treemonitors. WHile timors are slightly different in their general care, the following can be applied to timors, as well as any imported Indo monitor..

The thing that most people overlook is hydration.. Every imported reptile arrives in a weakened state, and this is mainly because of dehydration. Getting an animal properly hydrated should be your first priority-keeping in mind that you set up proper basking temps as well.

The link below also offers my personal view on parasiticides and their treatment/combat.. There are many acceptable methods used to acclimate imported monitors, and this one has worked with great success with my animals. I suggest you at least read it, and see a bit of a 'different' approach to acclimating WC's...

Cheers, best of luck with your new animals.. If I were you, I would work on getting them re hydrated, not so much on food... a dehydrated animal somtimes will not feed for good reason... anyways, it's all addressed below..

Take care, have a wonderful day.

Bob
TREEMONITORS.COM- my acclimation techniques

now, going back over your original post, I see that your vet instructed you to put food in your animals mouth, ie. forcefeeding... I don't think your vet could be any wronger in his 'diagnosis'/'prescription'... Force feeding a stressed out(unhealthy) monitor/reptile is usually the worst possible thing that you can do to it... Aside from the fact that you can injure its jaw and mouth while prying it open, you are forcing something down your animal's throat that it obviously doesn't want for a certain reason...

An animal that does not feed tells me that there is another issue causing it's unwillingness to eat.. You do not correct the situation by forcing the animal to eat, you find out what the problem is that is making it not want to eat, and in most cases, it is because the animal is dehydrated.. A poorly hydrated animal is going to have a difficult time performing regulary bodily functions, especially digestion...

It really aggrevates me to see keepers and Vets(people who are supposed to be experts at treating sick animals) prying reptiles' mouths open, and shoving food down their throats... Remember, that reptiles' metabolisms are not like us mammals.. WHile we may not be able to go long without food, as we need a constant intake to keep our bodies going, reptiles are much different, and can go long periods(months, sometimes even years) without food.

Many people view their pet reptiles, as they would their pet hampster, whereas a hampster would die if it didn't eat in three or four days... When a reptile doesn't eat for a week, or two weeks, they automatically soon, that this animal is going to starve to death, and they shove food down its throat, without correcting the problem first....

When are people going to realize that Reptiles are not mammals, and have many different anatomical, behavioral, physiological, and ecological properties, which differ greatly between the two classes... But it is us humans to give our pets "people like qualities", thinking that these animals are just like us, or our dogs and cats, and need similar care... The truth is much different than this...

Again, best of luck with your new captives.. Hopefully they'll come around, once the problem is fixed... Take care, have a great day!

Bob

TREEMONITORS.COM

Bob, i had not seen your web site before and find it interesting information packaged in an easy to find format. i have not had time to go through it all as i am pressed for time. I had meant to address the hydration in my reply also but forgot to do so. I am curious about your opinion on the use of electrolyte formulas when trying to rehydrate monitors. Any opinion?

I really see no need in using electrolytes in acclimating monitors, as just plain water has worked just fine for me. While I have no data, or prior studies to go by to make an educated decision on the matter, I would rather just use water, as mother nature has been doing it that way for billions of years now.. Water is Everything!!!! So what I am saying is, it could work, or it couldn't, it could have good results, or it could have bad... but as far as I'm concerned, I will stick to the water only method, as it is tried and true in my experience... It would be an interesting experiment however.... Cheers mate,

Bob

I won't chastise you about biting off more than you can chew but that's not an entirely unfair assessment.

First of all, as Bob indicated, your vet is an idiot. Find another. One that specializes in herps, if you don't have access to one, you're probably better off left to your own devices than wasting $ on a vet that knows nothing about herps.

I've acclimated a few freshly imported Timors and I never offered food in the first week or two. Just leave them alone and give them plenty of privacy.

You mention the room temp as being in the low 80's, I have no idea what you mean by that, but I hope they have access to a hot basking spot. You didn't mention that, but that is one of the things they need most right now. The basking spot surface temp should be at least 120 F. If you don't have a temp gun, you should.

If I were you, I'd treat the ticks with soaking.

Good luck,
Neal
-----
pale reason hides the infinite from us

Before everyone gets on the vet here consider that you are only getting one side of the story... and that it is over the net.

I agree that seeing an experienced herp vet is always a plus, especially with possibly serious cases. (I have to admit, I only quickly scanned the above thread)

Often when a problem is described over the net, or over the phone as in the vet clinic, the image is either minimalized, or it is exaggerated. Without actually seeing this animal it is hard to judge it's condition.

Assuming your veterinarian is familiar with monitor lizards it would be safe to say that force feeding is necessary. Did you discuss the issue of stress with the vet? The cause of anorexia for surely needs to be addressed asap, but sometimes upon examination it is deemed that waiting for an appetite to return is riskier than the detriments of stress. For whatever reason your veterinarian sees you as competent enough to force feed without physically hurting your lizard.
Also of curiousity, but was hospitalization offered? Again, another stress... there's to many things to way the pro's and con's on.

All in all, if your not happy with your veterinarian, seek a referal to another. (Be carefull to not wonder around just looking for what you want to here) There are many experienced people here, but no vets to my knowledge and direct contact with your monitor is lacking.

Good luck with your lizard

I am a relatively new monitor keeper, but I did work as a vet assistant in the early 80s. Of course this was basically a dog and cat vet, never did see any herps. Hydration is the first step, force feeding a last resort. Force feeding is very stressful and potentially harmful physically to your monitor. Timors stress easily as a species and tend to be very secretive and private. Yanking them out of their cages and wrestling with them to pry their mouths open doesn't seem conducive to getting them on the road to recovery at this point in time. Bob has had great success in acclimating wc tree monitors, while other people get them only to see them perish. Follow Bob's protocol and try to find a vet who may be more qualified to treat monitors. Too many vets say they treat herps, but their treatment is experimental at best because it is usually based on treating mammals. Good luck to you, I hope you can get them turned around and healthy.

Pam

I cannot think of a legitimate reason to ever condone force feeding an animal. Again, reptiles are well-built creatures, and are designed to go periods without food. It's their physiology.

It is very sad that people too commonly mistake a scrappy, skinny, monitor, with hip bones protruding, folds of skin along the side, as a 'starving' monitor... Stavation is not the reason for the loss in weight/noticeable skinniness... But, because people do not have first hand experience with this, they do not see that hydration is the reason, and they continue to stuff food down it's throat. A dehydrated animal will not have the proper pH in its stomach, nor have the proper conditions to digest. Therefore, the food will not be digested properly, and may even start to decompose inside of the animal to an extent, which is never a good thing.

Like I said, they are not eating for a reason. They did not stop eating because they have issues with their appearance and want to be lean for the upcoming Autumn Dance, or want to make weight for their next wrestling meet. Address the problem that is causing it, and they will resume eating.

Another thing which I find funny, is that people freak out when certain species stop eating in the winter. At a previous job, I would get dozens of people to call us up(usually in the winter months) of their boas and ball pythons stopping eating for a couple of months, and how they have begun force feedign them, with no results... STOP IT!!! some species naturally go off feed in certain seasons, as it is what they do during preparation/reproductive cycling...

It really cracks me up when these people go to the pet shop and buy 'reptile appetite stimulant' for their herps, thinking that this will get them to eat...hahahahaha... too funny....

I would love to hear of a documented cases where force feeding was necessary, and resulted in 180 degree improvement in the animal's health.... In my experience, force feeding usually results in a dead animal in the long run, as you are doing far more harm than good... Especially to an already stressed, and incompletely healthy monitor...

**I am also very leery when it comes to "reptile vets" as 99% of vets who claim to deal with "exotics-reptiles included" have absolutely no idea of what is going on. One thing that really gets me, is all the people who take their boas and pythons to vets, because of upper respiratory infections.. Vets very rarely ever conduct blood tests, to actually find out what is causing their pet's illness, they automatically assume that it is a bacterium causing it, and pump the snake with amikacin or enrofloxacin... without any official diagnosis... Isn't it funny that most people never get rid of the RI's, and that they are recurring, and seem to come back(usually much stronger) every year, or several times a year?? I have done some reading on the matter, and from what I was able to pick up, it seems that Boid RI's are caused by mycoplasmids, which weaken the immune system, opening it up for secondary infection, such as bacterium... So in actuality, these vets are not treating the main problem, just the side effect, hence their treatment is not doing anything to solve the problem.... Just an example... I do not trust injections of mammalian medicine on my animals, especially without seeing any bloodtest results....

What I am saying, is, be careful of who you choose as your reptile vet.. Some can be quaks... Like the one who charged a lady 250 dollars, as they took care of a snake whose eyes suddenly turned white... Fee included hospital stay for the week, special mineral baths, and injections.... the damn thing was just shedding its skin!!!! hahahahaha..

Do your homework, and find a vet that's tried and true when it comes to reptiles... Which can be a difficult task, depending on your geographic location... Cheers, best of luck with your timors...

Bob
TREEMONITORS.COM

Below is a segement of your post where you seem to contradict yourself you go off to say that forcefeeding is necessary and surpases the need of stress in this situation. Then you go off to say that hospitalization is a stress inducer? So which is more grave the force feeding or the hospitalization? I think the first of the two would be a stronger candidate for human induced stress. To force feed a monitor means you need to restrain it against it's will open it's mouth against it's will and force food down it's mouth against it's will. So there is three factors about force feeding that induce stress. Hospitalization for reptiles is not something that should be recommended "and i agree with you on this about it being a stress inducer", but you see how contradict yourself on stating that force feeding surpasses the stresses already induced by captivity is a bit misleading? Think about it these are wild caught animals. They can go for a really long time without eating......theyve been doing it for millions of years and will continue to do so. Anorexia ? you think that monitors have psychological problems that induce anorexia? Eating disorders do not go about happening to animals that are wild at heart not even dogs get anorexia......these animals simply dont think theyre fat and stop eating because of the way they look. They dont stand in front of mirrors asking themselves if theyre fat. They get skinny and die because of stress, bad husbandry, and dehydration.....when all these things are in tact they eat !!!! its that simple!!! So please quit misleading people and quit taking peoples text out of context and face the fact that the animal is stressed and will continue to stress if you keep mucking with it.

"Assuming your veterinarian is familiar with monitor lizards it would be safe to say that force feeding is necessary. Did you discuss the issue of stress with the vet? The cause of anorexia for surely needs to be addressed asap, but sometimes upon examination it is deemed that waiting for an appetite to return is riskier than the detriments of stress. For whatever reason your veterinarian sees you as competent enough to force feed without physically hurting your lizard.
Also of curiousity, but was hospitalization offered? Again, another stress... there's to many things to way the pro's and con's on."

i just reread your original posts and noticed a few things i wanted to ask. First is i did not see a response from you with additional information to questions asked in the replies. I am not sure, perhaps you are just overcome at all of the disagreement to what to do. I fully agree that you must make sure they are properly hydrated. As for force-feeding, years ago i ran out and bought a pinky pump for my corns that would not feed. How stupid was I? Pretty stupid. I didn't know how to get them to feed so I did the extreme instead of "learning" and most of the snakes still died. Now I will say that i do on occasion do something that i call "help feeding" for some species. Especially species that normally feed on other prey than what is available, it is sometimes required for me to gently place the prey into the mouth and gently hold the animal until it starts to swollow on its own. You do not force or jam anything. It is all done with tlc and very slowly. Things like T. wagleri that i have had dismal success in getting to feed in the past are now no problem whatsoever to get 100% eating on their own in a short period of time. The same can be done for monitors (but do not FORCE anything) BUT my main question is this. You said they had ticks? If this is the case please varify the size of these monitors. I had assumed that because they were infested with ticks that they were of larger size. Am I wrong? Perhaps the problem is just what you are feeding them. ALso in addition to knowing what size they are, i am wondering if the pinkies are live or dead? the more information you can provide the more information you can recieve but it will never be as good as having the animal seen in person by a QUALIFIED vet.

The vet isn't having me jam anything down their throats. She helped me on the first one by having me hold the animal while she put a syringe in the animal's mouth and squirt in a tiny bit of Hill's canine/feline food. She instructed me not to use the food very much, because it was very fattening, but that it would help get them up to weight in a short time.
The monitors range from 8" snout to tip of the tail, to 12". I've been using Ivermectin to spray them and their cage once a week.
I don't know how much this helps, but thanks for replying.