Gecko not eating and vomiting.

pouncingmailbox

New Member
Messages
1
Location
Iowa City
About your leo:
- Sex: Male
- Age & Weight: 3 years old: Underweight (I don’t have a scale available)
- Where was he/she obtained: +++++

A) Health/History
- How often do you handle the leo: Rarely
- Is your leo acting any different today? If so how does he she normally act and how has it’s behavior changed: Two notable changes have recently taken place. 1. The gecko will vomit after small amounts liquid food are administered.

- Has he or she had any problems in the past? For the past 6 months this gecko has refused to eat. When we initially acquired the gecko he would hunt and eat crickets voraciously. Gradually his appetite slowed down, as he got bigger. Eventually he began to refuse crickets and would only eat wax worms. More recently he has refused to eat waxworms also. We currently are unable to get him to eat any type of worm or cricket and had resorted to force feeding him ground up cricket paste mixed with a small amount of water. This worked well for about a month but now he has began to vomit up the small amount of food that we do force feed him through a syringe.

B) Fecals
- Fecals have been more liquidy than usual. I attribute this to us force feeding him a past/liquid slurry of crushed up crickets.
- When he was healthy, before we started force feeding him, his fecals were hard.
- He pooped about one day ago.

C) Problem
- He wont eat.

Housing:
A) Enclosure:
- 5 gallon tank: Size
- Type: Glass
- Substrate: Paper towels
- Two hides: 1 warm (half hollow log) under heat lamp. 1 Moist hide: Tupperware container with hole cut in it filled with damp paper towels that are kept wet.
B) Heating
- 1 (over tank) heat lamp bulb heater and 1 (under tank) adhesive pad heater. Heaters are hooked up to a thermostat with the regulator gauge on floor of the hot side of the tank.
- Cage Temps: Hot side = 85-90 F (lightbulb on vs off) and Cool side= 75 F
- Digital thermometer with probe on the floor of the cage
C) Cage Mates: None

Diet
A) Typical diet
- Crickets ~ 5 – 7 medium
- Wax worms 5 – 10
- He was hand fed using chopsticks or tweezers
- Fed every other or every 2 days
- Worms were often left in the cage inbetween feedings
- Supplements: Calcium powder, zilla vitamin spray, zilla calcium spray. These were administered every other feeding. Calcium powder was always available in the terrarium

Pictures:
IicNUwVh.jpg
 

Ruvik

New Member
Messages
283
Location
United States
He isn't digesting food. Your set up is wrong.

For one a five gallon tank is way too small. You need AT LEAST a 10 gallon but I would really get him a nice 20 gallon.

Two. Take away the heat light and get a UTH (Under Tank Heater) . He isn't able to get the belly heat he needs to digest the food.

Changes these things and do a vet visit ASAP.
 

indyana

Well-Known Member
Messages
2,336
Location
Massachusetts, United States
He has a UTH, so that's okay.

Parasites could be to blame. Also, is it just the photo, or are his front legs "bendy"? That could be a sign of calcium deficiency, but it's difficult to tell from the photo above.

Anyway, I also have to recommend a vet visit, to get a general assessment and a test for parasites done.
 

discoverlight

New Member
Messages
165
Location
Ontario
Definitely see a vet, call up some vets in your area and get some rates for checkups, fecal samples, and make a budget and find the cheapest vet if you're short on cash.

5 gallon is a lot too small. Is he/she drinking? It looks like it might be parasites, one of my rescues passed from parasites and a bad respiratory infection, it was too late for a vet visit...so get them somewhere they can get treatment asap.
 

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