sick rescued leo! please help!

About your leo: Meat Head
- Sex- male
- Age & Weight- unknown age (at least three yrs), 40 grams (no tail)
- How long have you owned your leo- I have owned him for about a month
- Where was he/she obtained (ex. Pet store, breeder, wild caught, friend)- I received him from my older brother who has no idea how to care for reptiles. this is the third lizard I have rescued from him.

A) Health/History
- How often do you handle your leo- daily if he is being actve
- Is your leo acting any different today? If so how does he/she normally act which differs from now.- no difference
- Has he/she had any problems in the past, if so please describe.- he is blind ( born blind, but eyes shriveled because he was kept on an overheated heat rock), he has had prolapsed hemipenes, refuses to take food (force fed), he has an abscess lanced on his left side of face, attacked by cats, wounded and tail ripped off.
B) Fecals
- Describe (look any different than normal)- normal
- When was the last time he/she went- today
C) Problem
- Please briefly describe the problem and how long it has been going on- he has three problems. the hemipenes have gone back into his body, but the right one is extremely swollen tender and reddish-purple in color. also, his eyes are shriveled and the shed skin is sticking to them, building layer by layer. and finally, probably not really serious, he keeps sneezing, and is toing so to my wrist as I type this!

Housing:
A) Enclosure
- Size- 20 gal. long
- Type (ex. glass tank)- glass aquarium, screen lid
- Type of substrate- paper towel, changed whenever he defecates.
- Hides, how many, what kind- two hides, on ginormous plastic one spanning the entire UTH and more, and a large wooden log tunnel on the cool side.
B) Heating
- Heat source- UTH
- Cage temps (hot side, cool side)- hot:85-90 cool:73- 80-ish
- Method of regulating heat source- none
- What are you using to measure your temps- regular mercury thermometer
- Do you have any lights (describe)- none


Describe Diet:
A) Typical diet
- What you're feeding (how often, how much)- mealworms , maybe a waxworm once in a while to entice him to eat
- How are you feeding (hand fed, left in dish, ect)- usually force fed, unless he decides to cooperate which is really rare.
B) Supplements (describe how often)
- What vitamin/minerals are you using (list brands)- repashy supervite (dusted once a week), rep-cal calcium with no phosphorus or vitamin d3 (given in bowl in tank, and reptocal calcium with d3 (light dusting every feeding)
- What are you gut loading food with- whole oats, apples and potatoes
about him: Meat Head is a very special lizard to me. he used to belong to a very close family friend who tragically passed of cancer in 2011 at age 19. my older brother then inherited him, where everything went downhill. he finally gave him up to me ( like he does with every reptile he gets) and I have been slowly nursing him back to health with the aid of the local reptile store. though he has improved by leaps and bounds, I would still like more input from others! this is the only momento I received from our friend so I need this lizard to heal. thank you!

anyone? this special lizard needs our help!

It seems as if you're doing good things for this lizard. If there's stuck shed it really needs to come off and it should with successive soakings and maybe gentle rubbing with a wet q-tip and your finger. The gecko is having enough problems that I'd really recommend a reptile vet visit.

Aliza

acpart said:

It seems as if you're doing good things for this lizard. If there's stuck shed it really needs to come off and it should with successive soakings and maybe gentle rubbing with a wet q-tip and your finger. The gecko is having enough problems that I'd really recommend a reptile vet visit.

Aliza

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thank you! ill try to get the shed off, and ill save my money so I can get him to the vet! the only reputable herp vet in town is on the other side of town, but until I can get him there ill just try to keep him as healthy and comfortable as I can. he's a trooper, so he should be fine in the end.

Aww poor little fellah! It breaks my heart to read your post

At the same time im so happy he found you (orrather, you found him) I would give the same advice as Aliza. Taking him to the vet is the best thing you can do for this little guy! Im glad you responded so well to her advice Not all people consider the vet as an alternative, unfortunetely...

In the meantime, I suggest you try to tingle his nose with dusted mealworms and try to get him to eat on his own. But Im not surprised if he wont respond to that, so I would highly recommend the slurry recipe that you can find as a sticky post in this section of the forum. Also does he have a moist hide in his cave? If no, thats one way to alleviate some of his issues.

I will keep my fingers crossed for this poor gecko. I think you should tell your brother to not get any reptiles in the future from here on. But I think you probably have told him this already :/

Keep us updated! I wish your gecko all the best! Its such a shame to see him in his current state, and I really think he will get better in your care

Thank you for the support, if I see any improvements, or if the vet says anything ill definately post an update of his progress! and yes, I have told my brother countless times that he need to at least do research before getting a pet, but its like talking to a wall. the last lizard I received from him was an emaciated tokay gecko. he was over a foot long, but he was kept in a 10 gallon long tank, fed only ten crickets once a month, and was kept on his apartment balcony for heat in the middle of summer! (it gets to about 110-118 degrees during the day here), and he was in a glass tank with no shelter! my brother didn't even no what species he was when I received him! poor thing was too far gone when I finally convinced him to fork him over to me... rip Rusty! same situation with the anole, but he never officially gave me that one. he died before I could convince him. but my Meat head is much stroner then the others, and I know he can make it! so fingers crossed!

Poor baby! He looks like he needs a LOT of love and special care. And with the (extremely likely, given the symptoms & picture) infection in his hemipenal pouch, he's going to need a vet visit for sure. If he's sneezing, he might also have a respiratory infection. Definitely get him in to the herp vet when you can.

im going to save my pennies, because the only good reptile vet in the area charges a ton for just exams! and im not gonna go to the last vet who tried to tell me my rosy boa was venomous... now to figure out how to earn money...

UPDATE: I managed to remove enough of the stuck shed from his eyes for him to be able to freely blink again! the pics rom left to right are, 1: his right eye, 2: his left eye, 3:left eye again plus the scar from where he had an abscess lanced, and 4: a smile to show his eagerness to heal, and to thank you guys for the support and advice! (he definitely wasn't trying to eat me or anything since I was messing with his eyes! pfft...:main_lipsrsealed . ill keep you guys updated on his recovery as best I can, but til then I would appreciate any more advice any of you have! oh, and he willingly ate some mealworm pupae today! only thing I haven't had to force feed him so far! wish us luck!

finally figured out how to make my pics bigger! here are bigger versions of already posted pics!

fyi, the skin on his eyes (in the bigger pics right below) came mostly off after a nice soak and gentle rubbing!

how is he doing now?

well he seems to willingly eat mealworm pupae, so that's good! hes put on about three- four grams in the past five days or so, but im weighing all of my geckos on Wednesday, so ill tell you his weight then! but also the skin on his eyes came off enough for him to be able to blink again but sadly it will be a little linger until we can get him to the vet because we had to take our dog in for an emergency surgery yesterday... so there goes those savings.... but we should be able to save enough to get him in before the month ends, but for now he seems to be doing pretty good. thank everyone for the support! wish us luck!

thats good news . so sorry to hear about your dog, hope its okay.

the dogs fine now (he has lots of pain pills) but a parasitic desert plant got shoved between his toes outside, and somehow worked its way up to his ankle, causing a major infection that swelled to the size of the golf ball! yet another reason the desert sucks you get attacked by the plants! haha! well I will be posting an update on Meat Head tomorrow! thank you everyone for your advice and support!

wow how weird. our dog got an infection from a grass seed that got stuck inbetween her toes, its not nice.

wow that is weird! I didn't know grass seeds were sharp enough to do that! either way, last night I managed to get Meat Head to eat (and keep down) 3 mealworms, and I weighed him today, and he is 42 grams, so he is beginning to put on some decent weight! now he just needs to keep it up! ill continue posting updates occasionally, and post some pictures of him eating soon! thank you! keep your fingers crossed!

well, today (last night? its 3 in the morning here) meathead decided to throw up all of the food I managed to get him to eat. I weighed him about two hours ago and he has started dropping weight, so I had to defrost a cube of the slurry, and I got him to lick about 4 cc's of that. this is definitely a step backwards but i'm not giving up yet! ill just keep on giving him the slurry every day, and hopefully he will put on that weight again! now I will need to save my money and do much more, so that I can get him to the vet... keep your fingers crossed or us!

so sorry to hear he started throwing up again, fingers crossed the slurry works. id do little and oftern so as not to overload him.

I gave him barley 1 cc of the slurry, and he still managed to throw that up... im afraid he has taken a turn for the worst n the past couple nights. he is developing an abscess on his jaw, he has become very very lethargic, his eyes started oozing yellow pus today, and his hemipenes have swelled a huge amount...we are trying to get him to the vet tomorrow, but im afraid that he may be too far gone, and has given up the will to live... the most humane thing to do for him would probably be to put him down, no matter how much it kills me... we will schedule an appointment tomorrow and see what they can do. ill post here after we know for sure what is going to happen. wish us luck.