Reptile & Amphibian Forums

i have been trying to have him drink pedialyte and calcium syrup from eyedroppers to make him better. he does not like it. now he looks at me funny and has run away a few times when he sees me. this is not normal behavior for him. do they have short memories when it comes to these things or do i have to try and make frinds with him again. he still eats from my hand but does not run to me or up my arm.
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150-200 tropical fish

3 African Clawed Frogs (1 olive and 2 albino)

Luca - male Ornate Uromastyx via Audrey Vanderlinden

- Mike
Morris Cty, NJ

- in memory of Magnus (male Uromastyx Macfadyeni)
he will always be my little boy

i don't have tons of experience with sick uros but anytime i have had to give helga medicine, she hates me for a little while after but she is a little skittish to begin with. like she does not try to hurt me or anything but she will go hide when i walk in the room. i think it is a good sign he is still eating from your hand and hopefully a good sign that he is feeling well enough to be ticked off
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vonnie
***There is no pleasure in having nothing to do; the fun is in having lots to do and not doing it. Mary Wilson Little ***

I can't tell you if it's memory or tendency, but I'm going to guess short term memory and/or strong individual tendencies. With no formal scientific basis, of course

My flighty animals are more likely to regress to being flighty after an amount of work socializing them while my friendly animals are more likely to regress to being friendly after some incident that causes them apprehension (cage changes, medication, etc.) Whether it's a strong tendency to behave in a consistent manner or a short term memory for their angst, or something else entirely, I couldn't tell you, but this is a fairly regular pattern for the various species I keep. You can describe it either way.

As pleasant as my new Ornates have been, I can't imagine them being standoffish for a very long time.
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2.3.0 uromastyx geyri (Saharan/Nigerian)
0.0.4 uromastyx hardwickii (Indian)
3.6.0 uromastyx macfadyeni (Somalian)
1.2.0 uromastyx ocellata (Sudanese)
1.3.0 uromastyx ornata (Ornate)
1.0.0 uromastyx benti pseudophilbyi

I'm just kidding.

I'm just catching up on all the posts, so bare with me. I'm assuming that if your feeding pedialyte he's dehydrated and sick, and not eating on his own. If so, definately continue with the "forced" feedings. Do what needs to be done to make him better. Once that's done, he will come back around to his normal self. Runako took a long time before he stopped running into his hide whenever I walked into the room, and eventually he'd stay still while I picked him up.

After escaping outside when we moved, it was back to square one, but he got back to normal fairly quickly.
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2.1 - Rocky, Runako, and RoxyIII (my care sheets)

>i have been trying to have him drink pedialyte and calcium syrup from eyedroppers to make him better.

I am curious as to what the vet found that he/she thought calcium syrup would cure?

As this little guy seemed apparently healthy when shipped and eating well immediately thereafter, I would take a very close look at husbandry and stressors.
There has to be an underlying cause if the animal had been eating well and continuing to lose weight.
If you have not already done so, I would suggest giving Audrey a call and asking for her input.
It does not hurt to have a fecal repeated and if for some reason the vet office is not doing both a float and smear, I would request it.

Thanks for all the advice everyone! This is what is going on. Luca was absolutely fine until this past monday when he arose very lethargic and would not eat and did not keep his eyes open often. This continued on tues and I took him to the vet and besides how he was acting he seemed fine (i though he was dying he looked so bad). On Fri he went back to the vet after not improving. They hydrated and tub fed him and he received his 2'nd B12 shot. At that point Audrey told me to also try the pedialyte and blueberries. By the next day he was eating on his own and coming back to his normal self. After keeping in touch with Audrey and reviewing my husbandry (everything is ok) she felt that he has a calcium deficiency. So the vet gave me the drops that Luca does not like. Now it is Tues and he is almost back to himself. Eating good and took a nice big poop today. One funny thing... when I weighed him on Sat he was at his all time high of 69grams. Things I have or will change > I put in a brand new UVB bulb to be safe and I am going to start him on Miner-All with D3(he does not like it and will ignore his veggies). I have not been giving him many sups and just trying to feed correctly but I am going back to sups now. He was sked for blood work yesterday (if he still was not eating) that I xld after deciding with Audreys input to hold off on it. So now my only issue with him is that he runs from the eyedropper and is really PO'd at me... he looks at me funny! I will continue to monitor him and see how he does over the next week.

any ideas?

Mike
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150-200 tropical fish

3 African Clawed Frogs (1 olive and 2 albino)

Luca - male Ornate Uromastyx via Audrey Vanderlinden

- Mike
Morris Cty, NJ

- in memory of Magnus (male Uromastyx Macfadyeni)
he will always be my little boy

is there anything he absolutely cannot resist? helga hates supplements too but when she gets a cricket as a treat or anytime she gets fresh peas, i put supplements on them because she will look passed it just to have the peas or the cricket. if it is sprinkled on her salad, i can forget about her eating or eating alot. hugo on the other hand does not turn down anything
i am glad he seems to be doing better for you!
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vonnie
***There is no pleasure in having nothing to do; the fun is in having lots to do and not doing it. Mary Wilson Little ***

i have tried it on his fav veggies already but will again. right now i am happy he is eating. something new for him this week is the alfalfa/clover sprouts... he loves them. i may try some miner-all on them and maybe some calcium too. Audrey has also reccommended Repcal pellots so i need to look into that also but not sure if he can have that with the other sup.
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150-200 tropical fish

3 African Clawed Frogs (1 olive and 2 albino)

Luca - male Ornate Uromastyx via Audrey Vanderlinden

- Mike
Morris Cty, NJ

- in memory of Magnus (male Uromastyx Macfadyeni)
he will always be my little boy

Have you tried mixing the pedialite & calcium in with baby food puree of their favorite treat?
What calcium syrup are you using? I have use neocalglucon before with good results. It's sweet, so my uros licked it off the dropper.
rather than an eyedropper, see if your local petstore has plastic syringes for hand feeding baby birds. the 1 or 2 cc ones are useless, get one of the bigger ones (mine is 6 cc) so once his mouth is open you don't have to refill the syringe. You have to cut the end of the syringe at an angle to use it as a wedge to get your little guy to open his mouth.
--benedita

thanx for the advice. it has been several days since i have had to give him anything now. i only gave him the calcium for 2 days and he was showing so much improvement that i stopped that and the pedialyte on audreys advice. the calcium the vet gave me is 30 Calcium Glubionate. audrey told me it is used on preemie babies also. the vet gave me a plastic syringe that measues and i was just letting it drip to his mouth. even though i am not using the calcium anymore i have saved it in my refrig for future use if ever needed. hope that is ok to do.

luca is totally back to normal. he is eating very good and also eating his veggies with the miner-all on them. right now i am focusing on trying to find the rep-cal iguana food for him that audrey recs. i am hoping that with this, some supps and feeding the proper foods as i always have i will avoid any future probs with his health.
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150-200 tropical fish

3 African Clawed Frogs (1 olive and 2 albino)

Luca - male Ornate Uromastyx via Audrey Vanderlinden

- Mike
Morris Cty, NJ

- in memory of Magnus (male Uromastyx Macfadyeni)
he will always be my little boy