My gecko won't eat :(

Help,
My leopard gecko has stopped eating. I recently put in calci-sand which is extremely fine and I filter out the clumps, but I'm worried my gecko has impaction. He stoped eating about 1.5 weeks ago and about 6 days ago he eat 6 mealworms and pooped normally, than hasn't eat since. About my Leo Gecko.

My gecko is a male I believe, I got him in April so he's around 6 months old, He was obtained at a local petsmart.
Health Hisory

I handle my gecko about twice a week exept recently I've been giving him hot baths every night. About 10 days ago he stopped eating, than randomly eat than stopped again. He has never done this before however I just added sand when he started not eating. His poop is normally a black "log" attached to a white"log" a little less than an inch long daily.
Cage

My gecko has a 20 gallon terrarium with calcisand from zoomed I beleive, an open basking area with rocks, a cave in the mirror and a log and water dish on the cooler side. I use a basking light, 75 watt from zoo med over my basking area, and at night I have a red 75 watt red bulb at the same spot. It stays a little over 90 on the basking side and about 77-83 on the cool side. He has no cage mates.

Diet

I usually feed him 10 mealworms daily in a dish, and than a separate calcium dust dish. I use reptisafe water cleaner daily. I do not gutload mealworms.

If you could please help me, I am afraid my gecko will die due to starvation and I am not sure if he has impaction.[img][/img]

Welcome to the LGF. I am sorry your leo is unwell, I hope we are able to help.

Can you post a picture? I think you tried, but it didn't work. A picture of the leos belly can also help in this situation as well. To learn how to post a picture look here.

First, get rid of the sand ASAP. You should never use loose substrate because of the risk of impaction, especially in young leos like yours. Replace the sand with paper towels for now, but in the future think about using tiling (slate, ceramic or peel-n-stick). Calcisand is especially bad because the leo will try to eat the sand for the calcium.

Leos don't bask. They get their heat from their bellies, to help digest their food. You need to get an UTH (under tank heater). Leos don't get anything from the overhead heating systems. You need a hot side and a cool side. The hot side has the UTH, and the cool side doesn't. Hot side should be 88*-95* on the floor, not the air. The floor temp is what you need to measure, with a probe thermometer. You should have minimum of 3 hiding spots. 1 on the cool side, 1 on the hot side and 1 moist hide. The moist hide is filled with paper towel or moss that is misted daily, which helps them shed.

You need to gutload the mealworms from now. If you don't, your leo isn't getting any nutrition from them. What the mealworms are eating is essentially what your leo is eating. You need to gutload the mealworms for a minimum of 24 hours before feeding them to your leo. You can gutload with veggies and fruits, like carrots, apples etc.

His poop sounds normal. The white "log" is the urate, the urine. Has he pooped since he stopped eating?

Why are you giving him baths? To try to get him to go to the bathroom? Generally baths are only reccomended for leos having trouble shedding. Be careful as leos can get respiratory infections easily if they get water up their nose.

Please read this and this. It will help you a lot.

Leos can go quite a while without eating. The worry is the impaction, as the blockage can cause the death.

Hopefully the changes I've suggested will help your leo. If it is impaction you really need to see a vet. I'm sorry.
I hope I've helped.

Ok, I have a reptile carpet which I used before, but I was wondering if using slabs is better. I plan on removing the sand, and adding a moist hide later today. Also I don't know how big the uth should be, because when I bought my Leo the worker eho owned 2 said to use lights. The reason I was bathing him is because I read that you should if they are impacted. I bathed him in shallow water so it barely touched his belly. I will try and upload an image of his belly and his terrarium later.

Ok, I was also wondering how you gutload mealworms? here are some pictures i just took.

I wouldn't use the repticarpet. Repticarpet is a breeding ground for bacteria, its impossible to get everything out of it. Especially if your leo is sick right now, I wouldn't use it. Paper towel is the best option right now, but as I said tiling is best. You can get it at home improvement stores. I use the peel-n-stick kind and they work great, and look great too.

The UTH heater should cover 1/3rd of the floor. So measure the length of the tank and divide by 3. The UTH should be 1/3 the length of the tank.

If it is impaction, you can try the shallow bath and rubbing his belly gently down towards his vent (base of tail), that may help a little bit. You can also try dabbing a bit of mineral oil on his nose (just a drop).

I really recommend taking him to a herp vet to maybe get some x-rays done. Is there any marks on his belly, like blue or black, that you can see through his skin? If you look up "leopard gecko impaction" on google images you'll see what I mean.

To gutload feeders you put apples, carrots or other fruits and veggies into a container with the feeders. I feed mealworms to my leo like you, so I keep them in a container with oatmeal as the substrate. Its just a tupperware container filled with about 1 inch of oatmeal, and a few chunks of carrots. The mealworms eat the carrots, and get fat and nutritious. You should also get a multivitamin. Alot of members use reptivite all in one. Its got calcium, vitamin d3 and multivitamins. You dust the feeders with that.

He has no spots under his belly and looks fine, and he even eat like 1 mealworms yesterday and 5 days ago he eat 7 and pooped fine so I have a feeling it's not impaction but tommorow I'm going to see a person I know who works at petsmart about it and to maybe buy tiling and a uth.

Is the person from petsmart the same person who told you to use the heat lamps?

I don't recommend getting advice from people who work on stores generally, especially stores like petsmart. If it was a reptile specialty shop than maybe.

If he's pooping thats a good sign. I'm sure others will chime in soon on advice.
Sometimes leos will just go off eating for a few days.

Another reason he could not be eating is he has become bored of his diet. Its a good idea to provide a variety of food, like mealworms, superworms, dubai roaches. And waxworms, phoenix worms and butterworms can be given as a treat once or twice a week (1 or 2 worms at a time).

I don't mean to make the accusation that you don't know what leo poop looks like, but did it look like actual poop or could you actually make out the meal worms? I'm curious if what you've seen as waste is actually regurgitation and he isn't actually keeping food down.

First of all, the person is not the same one who told me to get the headlamps, and I'll get some waxworks or superworms tommorow because I did notice him starring his food down as usual yesterday but he didn't eat it he just walked away, and second he is not regurgitating the food he pooped normally that time, just like every other time. I think I am going to get tile from home depot tommorow as well, but I didn't know if I should get ceramic or porcilan tile? And I just put 500 mealworms into a gutload container and they are eating carrots and lettuce right now.

I'm not specifically sure of the heating capabilities of porcelain but unglazed ceramic tile is perfect. Like I said, I don't mean to make accusations that you don't know what you've seen; I just wanted to touch all bases before we move to a "vet visit required" resolution.

ya i know, so what do you think i should do about him not eating?

At the size your guy is i wouldn't panic about him not eating if its only been 6days/1.5weeks, just try him on different foods as he could just be bord of what your offering. Do you know how much your boy weighs?
I have males that go for upto 6months without eating when its breeding season.

Wow, Last time i weighed him i believe he was 50grams which was about a month ago, and Tonight im trying him on gut-loaded mealworms, but tommorow im buying some superworms to see if he will eat those. also when is breeding season? Because to me he looks fairly healthy and he eat ALOT before he stopped eating(10-15 mealworms a day) and probably would have eaten more if i put them in.

BTW
Thanks for all the help, im sure ill figure this all out with your help!

Ok after reading all this here's my 2 cents... first off read the perfect leo set up sticky if you haven't already. Its in the housing section. Next get your uth asap. This is NOT an optional piece of equipment. As kathryn said belly heat is most important as leos are thigmatherms, they thermoregulat thru their bellies, laying on hot rocks and absorbing the heat. Lights are recommended for heliotherms like bearded dragons that bask out in the daylight. Leos don't "bask" since their crepuscular (up after sunset and right before sunrise). All lights do, even red ones, is stress leos which can put them off food.

Next ceramic and porcelain are both insulators (think coffee mug here) and not the best conductors of heat. The best tile is either natural stone like granite, marble or slate, or high end vinyl tile. Those are your best conductors of heat. Make sure to use the rough side of the stone tles so your leo has traction and doesn't get splayed legs.

Next... your leo could be starting to brumate for the inter depending on your loation. Shoter aylight hours and dryer air will tell your leo its time to brumate and they will be inconsistant eaters. Just kee offering food on a regular basis. Offering food in a more enticing way such as dropping it in instead of feeding from a bowl will trigger a better feeding response. Your leo wants to "hunt" hence the looking at food and walking away. It isn't enticed and can't zero in on food unless it moves.also feed appropriately sized food, your leo can eat anything that is smaller around than the space between its eyes. Smaller food is also unappealing. Once you start feeding supers your leo will likely only need 2-4 per feeding and at 6 mos he's likely read to be swittched to every other day offerings . Make sure to properly gutload, no apple seeds tho if you use apples, as that's where aresnic comes from, and no spinach because it binds to calcium and can't be absorbed.

So hope some of this helps. Good luck.

Ps, kathryn warm baths are suggested to help relieve constipation but it does no good if the leos belly isn't. In the water.

Kermit wrote: Ps, kathryn warm baths are suggested to help relieve constipation but it does no good if the leos belly isn't. In the water.

I know now Kel, thanks! I just meant that rubbing his stomach may help to dislodge anything if he was impacted.

He's probably not impacted if he's pooping which is good. I'm glad we've ruled that out.

I think he's either bored with his food, or going to brumate as Kel suggested.

Have you been able to get the UTH yet? Its really important that you get one.

I got a Uth and put waxworms in his food dish, and he hasn't had one yet, but my petsmart said he's proboly conserving energy and he is still in good shape with a fat tail.