Reptile & Amphibian Forums

well, just last night i went to spray my gex, and yet another problem has arisen. my "newer" female henkeli (not really new anymore), seems to have suddenly developed a problem like floppy tail in cresteds. i dont know if it's from injury or what, but my instincts are making me think a calcium deficiency. it was very sudden, and she has shown no other symptoms. i felt around her body a bit, and while she doesnt feel spongy, she doesnt feel quite as rigid as she ought to be. im working on finding a qualified vet in the area, which isnt fun because ive never used any vets in this area (since i recently moved), plus we all know my past vet experiences. ive lost the link, but i know theres a list of qualified herp vets out there, would anyone mind posting that for me? ben, if you're still lurking, do you have any advice?

thanks guys
-----
-Mike Martin
North Carolina

Hey Mike,
I have encountered similar problems as well, and upon isolating the gecko and running a fecal, the only thing significant that shows up is higher than normal amounts of coccidia.

I will add that in the two times this has happened to me, both females were cycling (one actually having been bred, the other was never bred)... A large part of me wants to think that the stress of egg production and egg laying is the cause and the effect is the lowered immunity to coccidia...

I would, in my case, rule out a dietary problem (from gut loading to the dietary source in general) because I have had females produce viable offspring on the same diet that they were receiving... The only thing I can reccommend is to assist feed her with chicken babyfood/herptivite/calcium diluted with a bit of pedialyte... If you can get a fecal ran, it would help a lot, but it does take a very experienced vet/vet tech to understand what a "normal" amount of coccidia (or any parasite for that matter) is... When females seem to be crashing like you describe, I immediately treat with trimethoprim/sulfadiazine (an antimicrobial) which seems to help... This is more of a preventative medication, but has, in my experience given the gecko the edge needed to recover...

You may have something else going on, but this is what I can share from my experience... Hope it helps!

Sorry for my absence...
-----
Ben

a great deal of thanks to you on this one ben. i am wondering how to get my hands on some of these things, or should i perhaps find a decent vet and talk to them of the things you've mentioned? first of all, she has laid several clutches for me in the past few months, although i think they're both done for now. she was the one who was giving me problems where at least one of her eggs always showed up cracked when i would find them the day after. the last egg she laid for me was july 21, which either makes her a lil past due for another or else shes done this season. the stress seems like a very viable possibility in this case seeing as she laid her last clutch as i had her packed up ready to move her, then we moved, then she spent about a week in a temporary enclosure as i built everyones tanks back up, and now shes in a new place, although for the most part everything has been the same since. she was eating just fine a few days ago. anyway, hopefully the problem can be pinpointed. one last question though...does the tail ever get fixed? on the one hand they're capable of regeneration, but on the other hand i wonder if the lack of overall tissue loss would set things to repair her tail bone?
-----
-Mike Martin
North Carolina

In my case, the geckos' tails did recover... but about three months later I lost one of the girls (dead on the cage floor one morning after she seemingly made a full recovery)... so its hard for me to make judgments on determining the cause of death... necropsy didn't show anything out of the ordinary... frustrating... I still scratch my head when I think about it...

I only trust the advice of two vets when it comes to treating my leaf-tails... merely because they have dealt with 100s of leaf-tails specifically... Even so, they are sometimes left at odds and are experimenting with new treatment regimes... For most herp vets in general, one can only take their broad knowledge of reptile medicine and apply it to leaf-tails... This goes without saying that their experience with the genus is essential...

Obviously, in your case I would find a vet that works with reptiles, they should be able to make a fairly accurate assumption as to what is in the poop (what should or shouldn't be there and what is a normal amount of "it"... Even better, if a vet in your area has worked with cams they are probably competent enough to ID a problem and take an educated approach to solving it (the two taxa seem to be congruent in most aspects when it comes to medicating)...

On the other hand, if it’s some other sort of abnormal bodily activity, they won’t do you much good in the way of seeing symptoms and pinpointing the problem… It’s just the sad truth…

You just have to find a herp vet that really cares; if they really want to help the animal, the resources are out there… and they are more readily accessible to them than they are to you…
-----
Ben

yeah about a month ago i had to isolate my female from the male. she layed about six or seven eggs and was deteriorating slowly. her tail shriveled up almost completely and it wasnt really dehyration but more so all of her fat reserves getting used up. she kinda lost her appetite for a while but i gave her some baby food slightly diluted with water then added repcal and herptevite. i usually only use fruit medly cuz my day geckos love it and from what i know geckos really have a hard time digesting beef or chicken. my female will drink like two eyedroppers full. it gives them a lot of nutrition and also serves as an appetite stimulant. the most stressful thing for geckos(besides getting eaten by a snake) is laying eggs and when you think shes had enough you should probably isolate her. if i were you mike i wouldnt take her to the vet. in your situation, with all the animals you have, you shouldnt really worry about a vet unless its a healthy animal(nutritionally) and it has a problem. shes prob just burnt out from breeding and needs to make a nutritional recovery. you cant get any kind of medication unless you bring an animal to the vet. my brother just uses his veiled cham to get whatever meds he needs. the place where you went w/ you corkbark killed his deremensis chameleon. they had it in a tub at like 90degrees and they need it cooler then some uros. i wouldnt bring an animal to the vet unless it was nutritionally healthy and had some other problem. but she should be able to make a full recovery if its just a lack of calcium and fat, just keep her by herself even if it is in a ten or fifteen gallon tank. good luck im goin to the show on sunday. ill see ya

I've seen this discussed on the veterinary information network several times (as with "floppy tail" in cresteds) and it is more often than not related to something other than calcium deficiency. A good diet, and the lack of egg development would support this in your scenerio if I read things right.

Often it is a sign of general weakness, perhaps low blood glucose. The underlying problems need to be addressed.

The link for herp vets is www.arav.com. They also have a link to herpvetconnection which is a client based referal site. Asking your local vets for referals will get you someplace as well.

Another poster mentioned the qualities of a good herp vet. I agree that some are in it because they are interested in seeing reptiles, while others, are passionate about reptiles and if there were enough to support a practice, they'd see only reptiles. For both types of vets the resources are out there. I already mentioned the VIN. I think every vet should have it. It's a forum sort of like kingsnake, but for vets only. There are specialists in parasitology, reptiles, nutrition ect active in every forum to help your local vet through a difficult case.

Good luck with your geckos
Ian

For those of you that aren't vets, vet techs or students, VIN also has a great resource that is accessible to everyone else. My mom used this to get info on their new puppy and liked it. I'd love to hear what everyone thinks of the quality of reptile information...

http://www.veterinarypartner.com/

I've never been to that part of the site, although I was aware of it... perhaps I'll pay a visit.

well, she crashed real fast. didnt get her in for a vet check fast enough, and by then end she started showing what might have been evidence of coccidia, and furthermore a calcium deficiency. it was probably a combination of breeding and moving around that lead to a coccidia explosion, which started the downward spiral.

-----
-Mike Martin
North Carolina

I'm sorry to here about your gecko. Send it off for a post-mortem to find out the what and why's of it's death. It's better then guessing so you can hopefully prevent if from happening in the future.

I checked out VIN's veterinary partner. I had high hopes but it's reptile contents were minimal. In addition, much of the inserts used were misleading to the average herp enthusiast. For example, the bovine serum used in curring crypto in savanna monitors. It's a little misleading. This is the description of a very limited experiment with the stuff that did show some promise. However only 4 animals were used (not enough for substantial evidence), and although some success was seen, I believe 3 of the 4 died. In addition, this bovine serum is not available to the public, or veterinarians. It was produced for this particular experiment in a university. All in all, not usefull for the person who wants to learn about disease management in their animal.

VIN is a great site on the vet side, but very limited resources have been used to advance vetpartner. Melissa Kaplan's site is informative, but I disagree with how much of the information is presented upon her personal opinion. It would be nice if Vet partner had their own articles that was fact based, or at least based on the opinion of the reptile specialist consultants used on the vet side.

Ian

Yes, I went and did some looking around shortly after I posted that message. The website is poorly lacking in original material when it comes to reptiles. I hope that changes as the website grows, but knowing the veterinary profession and reptiles, it may never get any better. There's just too few vets who really love reptile medicine, let alone someone to push the website... time will tell...

But if you have a problem with a dog or cat, its a great site! LOL