Anorexic Gecko!!! Help!!!!!

[MyGeckoBand]

About your leo:
- Female
- almost a year ish?
- I've owned her 8 months
- purchased from ++++++++

A) Health/History
- once, twice a month
- Usually she's very active in the evening/night. She is usually a great hunter and likes to curl up in corners.
Now she it lethargic. She does not hunt or eat. She ignores food (crickets and worms) even if they walk right in front of her. She has been laying out stretched on top of her hide or just against a wall. I also saw her yawn which I've not seen before.
- There have been no previous issues
B) Fecals
- She has not pooped in a few days.
C) Problem
- She's so skinny! Her tail is very, very thin and she won't open her eyes the whole way. Her whole body looks emaciated. She is laying flat as she moves instead of lifting her body. She's an albino, so I can always see her guts, so I'm not sure if they're abnormal. I also don't handle her often, so I don't have much comparison.
- Other problem, I can't afford to take her to the vet, so non-costly methods are kinda my only option

Housing:
A) Enclosure
- 20 gallon glass tank
- Reptile carpet
- Since I noticed her thin-ness I took the other gecko out so that Floyd is alone in her tank.
B) Heating
- one side has an under the tank heater, the other has a lamp
- 90 degrees and 80 degrees (on average)
- Full spectrum light during the day, heated night lamp is on all the time.
C) Cage mates
-Since I noticed her thin-ness I have separated her so that she's alone in the tank. Normally she has another leopard gecko with her. They have not had any problems in the past. If anything, she was the bully! Her cage mate is eating just fine, even leaving her portion of the food untouched.

Describe Diet:
A) Typical diet
- Gut loaded, calcium dusted crickets. maybe 6 every 3-4 days? I've never paid particular attention, but the two geckos go through about 24 a week, total. They've never had an issue sharing and tend to hunt on separate sides of the tank. As I said, though, she has been alone in her tank since I noticed her weight-loss and she is still not eating crickets or mealworms.
- She hunts them down like a boss - usually.
* Since she stopped eating I got some mealworms, thinking that maybe she was having trouble with the hunting part. I even got desperate and tried force feeding. She ate one worm, then rejected the next, even pushing it out of her mouth.
B) Supplements (describe how often)
- Rep-Cal phosphorus-free calcium with VIT.D3 powdered on the crickets
- Crickets eat Fluker's cricket quencher and Fluker's high calcium diet.

 

[indyana]

Reviewing all the info, I don't see huge issues with your setup. The temperatures look a bit warm, especially if the cooler side of the tank doesn't get into the 70s. It should be 90 F on the warm side as the floor surface temperature measured with a temperature gun or a digital probe and not ambient air temp measured by a little meter stuck to the side of the tank. Unless your house is cool (below 65 F), you probably do not need the heat night lamp on all night.

You should be dusting with a reptile multivitamin in addition to calcium/D3, especially for growing geckos. This provides other vitamins and minerals. When they are fully grown adults, you can drop down to dusting once a week.

Be aware that only feeding crickets all the time isn't good for the geckos in the long run. Maybe try switching up with other feeders you can find. Mealworms are commonly available at pet stores, and many are now stocking other types of bugs for lizards too.

But if I had to take a wild guess, I'd say your girl has some sort of parasites as well, which does require a vet visit. Just like with people, all issues cannot be solved without the help of a doctor. :\

To help her make it until you can get her to a vet, you can make a feed her a gecko slurry, which is easier to consume than entire bugs, but note that this will not cure her.
http://geckoforums.net/f130-health-medications/54742.htm
Golden Gate Geckos Information

 

[MyGeckoBand]

Ok, thanks. I'll try cooling down the cool side and see about the slurry.
Is the other gecko in danger of the parasites? They have not shown any signs and lived together up until a couple days ago. Would the parasite come from their food?

 

[indyana]

Yes to both questions. The other gecko could have parasites as well, even if she is not showing symptoms. Most parasites are picked up from food, although some can be spread through direct contact.

I'd concentrate on the sick girl for now, especially if you're short on funds, but keep in mind that your second gecko could be a carrier for parasites and try to prevent cross contamination between the two cages.

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Some tips for going forward:

One of the things to watch out for is letting insects run loose in the cage for too long, as they can eat gecko poop and parasite eggs. Then, when the geckos eat the insects later, they get reinfected with more parasites. You can try to stop this by picking up poop regularly and only putting in as many insects as the geckos can eat in about 15 minutes. Besides that, regular cage cleaning (scrubbing everything) cuts down on the possibility of parasites/eggs building up. Most reptiles, unless their owners test and treat them regularly, end up carrying some sort of parasites, which is why hand washing is really important.