is my leo sick????

Heyy guys I was just wondering if I could get some opinions and advice of what to do....I can't upload photos right now but I can tell you...I have noticed that my leo's tail has gotten thinner in the past week. But I still see him always eating running drinking pooping shedding and standing up strong...I don't know what's wrong with him his tail is skinny but his belly is really fat also...he is a juvenile round 6 and half inches in a 20 long tank with an adult female leo day temp is 80-90 night temp 80-8d degrees with four hides including moist hide water food and calcium bowl 60 watt day light and infered red 60 watt night light...so please help me guys idk what's wrong its scaring mee

Hi if you fill out the health questionnaire it will help us give better answers. It is a sticky thread in this section.

From what i've read though here is my input;

Your leo sounds active which is good, and since he is a Juvie, you don't need to worry about his tail too much. When they eat at that age it is all going towards growing and so not much fat will be stored in the tail
Though if he really IS 6 and a hlaf inch's long, then he ISN'T a juvenile. You might want to take a weight check on him.


Also, it is a VERY bad idea to have him housed with an adult female.
I'll just list a few of the problems and im sure some other members will list a few more;
- your male and female WILL breed which could possibly mean eggs your not reay for
- Your male will be pestering the female, stressing her out, making her potentailly ill and lose weight.
- Because your male is constantly pestering your female will lash out.
- this constant breeding will likely often end up with fights which could potentially end up fatal, ESPECIALLY if there is a size difference between the leo's.
- also if he is a juvie, you could run the risk of making him infertile or damaging his genitals due to premature mating.
- two leo's living together is bad enough as it is, there is the constant fighting for dominance, alpha male role, best food, best heat spot, best cool spot, best hide etc etc etc...
- and there is a lot more problems that come with breeding and housing leo's together.

Your temps are also a little low, they should be bumped up a few degrees, not a mjor issue, but it could be the reason your leo's belly is fat, because he isn't digesting properly.

The lights are likely adding to the stress of living together and breeding too, lights are not needed for leo's at all and only serve to stress them out.

As i say if you can fill out our health questionaire and post it into this thread it will help us give even more help in keeping your leo's healthy and regaining their health.
Here is a link to that questionnaire: http://www.leopardgeckoforum.com/t134-please-read-and-fill-out-with-your-health-questions

Agreed with Jordan, it would be very helpful to fill out the questionnaire. It just gives us a better idea if there could e anything else causing him to lose weight:)

Care questionaire
about leo:
male
n/a age and weight
normal or high yellow
owned 5 months
bought at petco
not sure if wild caught or captive but pretty sure pstco captive bred
health/history:
A)handle maybe once or twice every two weeks
not acting different
no problema in past
B)fecals
tail is getting thinner belly fatter skin brighter than normal
this morning
C)problem
belly looks larger than normal tail is getting thinner than normal it had been going for a week
housing
A)enclosure
20 g long
glass aquarium woth secure screen lid
repti sand
back left cave with hammack on top log in middle back right moist cave on top a foam underground burrow and in front of moist cave a medium magnetic reptile den
B)heating
main heat source day and night bulbs and zoo med under tank heater on left side glass
day 80-90 night 80-85
no method of heat source
petco thermometer and humidity gauge
blue zoo med 60w day light infrared red 60w night light.night loght goes on at 8pm and day light goes on at when I wake up
C)cage mates
one female
no problems of previous mates
diet:
A)typical diet
meal worms bowl in tank 24/7 then feeding crickets and ocassionally wax and superworms
feed every other day with 6-10 crickets
I drop the crickets in the tank
B)supplements
t rex calcium powder
no multi vitamin right now
dust every time I feed and I do leave calcium bowl inside tank 24/7
flukers gut load

Ok... looking at your questionaire I see a few things steraight off that could be contributing to your issues. First off the sand substrait.... BIG no no. Impaction, even accidental impaction is a real risk for leos kept on sand. Every time they eat a bug ioff sand they cant help but to ingest some sand with the bug. Also if it is calci-sand your herp could eat it intentionally also causing blockage. I would do away with the sand for an alternate substrait, one of the safe ones listed in the proper housing sticky in the LG section.

Second the bloated belly and brighter color could be that your leo just shed and ate his shed. Eros has a bloated belly when he sheds and won't eat for a few days thereafter because he's full of shed. Some leos will be very obvious when theyre going to shed and ghost up erally well, others won't ghost up hardly at all before a shed. Eros doesn't ghost up too much, just a little haze then bright and shiney BUT when you add the thinning tail to it I again am led to think impaction or partial blockage if your leo is still passing stool. You didn't mention what his fecals (poos) looked like so it is hard to comment on imopaction with out knowing how often he is pooing and what they look like.

Next I would bump your temps up tpo between 93-95 on his hot side. Higher temperatures means better digestion. Your leo will thermoregulate if a spot is too hot, he'll move IF you have provided hot and cool side hides for him. Don't worry about it being too hot until you reach around 98*F. He needs to be provided with the optimum range of 88-95*F regardless of whether or not he is using that spot he will when he feels he needs to.

Are you keeping water in his viv 24/7? The T-Rex calcium powder youre using is that the one that says leopard gecko dust by sandfire foods or does it specifically say T-Rex calcium?

Next your heating and temp monitoring. One of those thermometers with a humidity gauge is nice but inaccurate as it only measures AMBIENT (air) temps and not ground temps which are most important. It is suggested to invest in a probe thermometer and the probe end laid on top of the area that is over the heat mat for the most accurate temperature readings. These are pretty cheap, at wal mart lowes or home depot for under 10 bucks. You're using lighting... any particular reason why? adding lighting usually only goes to stress leos out. I find teh infra red lighting is no different. My leo will not come out under an infrared bulb but will tolerate a moonlight blue bulb nohigher than 60 watts. If you need to make up heat loss from your UTH this is the only time lighting is suggested but if youre making temps just find with the mat then no lighting is suggested unless your leo is in a dark room with minimal daylight to aide in his day/night cycle.

Your leo seems to be eating well but it's the quality of what he is eating that is going to make the biggest impact on his health. I see you're using flukers cricket load, not horrid but you would benefit much more from just using regular vegitable scraps such as carrot, potato, apple (minus the seeds and core) varied green leafy veggies (but not spinach as there is a chemical that binds to calcium making the leo unable to absorb it). I often hesitate to use crickets (in fact has never fed her leo a cricket), because of the whole fear of parasites and that huge cricket virus that wiped out so many cricket farms here in the states. I just don't trust them. Also they offer very little nutritional value, there is a table in the feeding sticky section that goes over the nutritional values of different feeder insects. It's worth a good read honestly. If your leo is large enough to eat super worms then that is a very good basic staple diet for him. As long as you don't feed prey larger than the space between his eyes (larger around that is) then your leo can eat it. he may not have intereste in mealies because their just too small and unappealing. If you were to use supers as your staple and offer a couple wax worms once a week, plus rotate in some butter worms on another alternate day youd have a great diet for him. Most stores that sell herps will carry a variety of worms, if not check your local bait shop. I find they often carry the more obscure bugs for the fishermen. Also if your leo is eating that much per feeding he's kinda telling us he needs to eat more to get the right nutritional needs met. Larger feeders provides more nutrition with less shell and other waste our leos don't need. Also excessive shell from feeders has been known to contribute to impaction as it is very hard to digest. Eros, my 1 year old boy eats 1-3 super worms 2x a week (his choice not mine) and he is doing great now that he's in his big boy pants Feeding properly sized prey will help avoid excessive feeding. Getting your leo started on a good multi vit will help replace thenutrients he is missing from his feeders and he should eat less when properly supplimented as his nutritional needs are being met. I use an all in 1 dusting powder, pretty fool proof, there is T-Rex leopard gecko dust ICB by sandfire foods, and there is Repashy leopard gecko plus ICB. Both are excellent, no noeed to leave an additional calcium suppliment in the tank and you dust every or every other feeding depending on age and condition of yuor leo. Eros only gets supplimented once a week obviously if he only eats 2 days a week.

So that's pretty much it for now unless you have any more questions... Sorry its so long

thanks alot guys all this info really helps alot I appreciate it

Youre welcome star

If at all possible, I'd get it checked out by a local reptile shop or a special herp vet. The impaction, if it cannot be passed by the leo itself, can lead to death.

Thankfully the leo has been able to pass some poop at least, so if it is impaction it seems that it would a partial blockage, which would eventually probably lead to a full impaction.

Which COULD possibly lead to full impaction if left unaddressed jolene. if she dabs some mineral oil on his nose for him to lap off it'll grease the tracks enough to help pass what's backed up since it's a laxitive. Also some warm soaks and a little belly rub can also help with blockage, not to mention I always here people saying that as soon as they take their leo on a car ride they always poop. Idk why but it's an interesting last ditch effoort kind of notion to get him to poo .

, thanks Kel for that clarification. I never understood the taking for a car ride either but I have heard it referred to a few time:)

You're welcome Jolene... just didn't want the op panicking that their leo was on death's door is all I never understood about the car rides either... maybe they get so scare it literally scared the crap outta them

It could be motion sickness, and they expel from the rear instead of the front. haha

That could be possible except that leos, unlike rabbits, do have the ability to throw up so I suspect motion sickness would comeout the appropriate end but intreaguging idea kodie

heres some pictures of him if you wanted to see and the tank their in
[img]http://www.leopardgeckoforum.com/[/img][img]http://www.leopardgeckoforum.com/[/img][img]http://www.leopardgeckoforum.com/[/img][img]http://www.leopardgeckoforum.com/[/img][img]http://www.leopardgeckoforum.com/[/img][img]http://www.leopardgeckoforum.com/[/img]

Hi Star, not sure how you posted your pictures but if you follow the instructions at the following link, it will post them nice and big so we can get a good look at them.

http://www.leopardgeckoforum.com/t338-adding-an-image-to-your-post

I know it is a little confusing at first, I couldn't figure it out without help.

From what I can see though they are in good shape:)