HELP! Skinny rescued Leos won't eat, sleep all day

[OZS]

1. What substrate are you using? - ZooMed Eco Carpet with a paper towel in the poop corner
2. What sized enclosure do you have your leo in? - 2 female Leos, 10 gal
3. What are your warm side temperatures? - 89 F
4. How are the temperatures measured? - 2 tank therms
5. What are you using as your heat source? - UTH
6. Do you have any method of regulating the temperatures? - no
7. How many hides do you have for your leo? What are they? - 1 large cave on warm side, some fabric leaves and a tunnel on the cool side
8. What food have you offered? - Wax worms, meal worms, butter worms
9. How often do you offer food? - food is in the dish 24/7
10. Are you supplementing the food? If so, with what and how often? -RepCal phosphorus free Ca +V D, every 4 days
11. How old is your leo? - Dont know, both are rescues, one is 4-5 inches and the other is closer to 7 in.
12. How long have you had your leo? - less than a month
13. Give a little detail about the behaviour of the Leo also - both have been very skittish but responded well to slow movement and gentle handling, recently the small bit of trust i gained has been lost and they wont eat, even when im not around.
14. Poop - Their poop changes, i know when they havent eaten because the poop has a small white bit and some clear moist part with some liquid. I dont think they have any impaction from substrate because the friend i got them from kept them on paper towels. Yesterday the larger one pooped a solid looking turd with a lot of watery discharge, it looked like she may have been constapated but i think she hadnt had anything in her digestive tract aside from a couple worms i force fed her and it may have been hard to pass just that. Theres a decent amount of calcium on the worms all the time, theres a bit extra at the corner of the dish in case they want more, and im going to try soaking them in a warm bath.


I got these rescues a few weeks ago from a friend who found them in a house that had been abandoned. Both are thin but the larger was much thinner, so much that i can see her hip bones and sometimes ribs. The larger one is my main concern, she has lost weight since i got her though i had fed and seen her eating on a semi daily basis. I got back from a two day vacation yesterday and noticed the drop in weight and the lethargy. She sleeps all day and all night, barely opens her eyes, she wont eat, shes still moving around the tank, but she is weaker. Sometimes they both just stare at the food and wont strike at it. The larger ones breathing seems shallower in the morning too, i get scared and rub her leg a little to see if shes still alive. Their tongues look paler and their coloration duller, the smaller one has shed since i got her, with no problems, but not the larger. I dont know what to do, theres food in the dish all day and night (eat primarily at night), they dont trust me and when i try to force feed the larger one she spits out the butter worm and it just seems like im stressing them out even more.

Please send as much advice as you can guys, i cant stand the idea of not being able to turn their lives around for the better.

my prof pic is of the larger one a few days after i got her and shes gotten worse, i'm doing everything I can.
-OZS


P.S. I'm trying to avoid handling them but if it comes down to it I might have to force feed the larger gecko, hope it doesnt get to that point thougb. If you have any advice please send tips on doing this as stress free as possible and any recommendations for force fed foods other than the whole/chopped up butter worms.

 

[OZS]

UPDATE: The smaller gecko has an appetite, she is eating even though she still doesnt like my hand or my voice, going to give the larger one a warm soak now.

 

[Nooon]

I´ve read on this forum about leos being force fed chicken baby food. That sound like reasonably right... but I did i in a different manner.
When I force fed my leo I made a mix of sqeezed out Zophobas and crickets. Not a nice to do but I still did it. I´d put a Zophobas in a small plastic bag, Nipped the head off using my fingers not breaking the plastic... and then squeezed it out of its shell like toothpaste getting the "paste" separated from the exo inside the plastic bag... I did the same thing to crickets. Then I mixed the "paste" with a tiny amount of calcium and vitamins by sqeezing it/the plastic bag making a squichy mess. When this disgusting part was over there was the tricky part - getting it into the lizard.
I force fed the "mess" using... nah - i don´t know your word for it (I´m a swede)... I mean this thing - http://www.medicalexpress.se/images/prodimages/250/sV21200.jpg No needle of course.
I found out that by gently pressing against the side of her mouth with the... thing... I could get her to open her mouth and get the tip of the thing in so that she could not close her mouth. Now... there is a danger getting the food into the leos lungs. Someone more experienced could help you with some tips to make it safer. I had no one to ask... but my little one survived both being sick and being force fed. When feeding her I took care not to give her too much at a time... but just a little bit of the "mess" and then let her swallow it before giving her more. I don´t see how a leo could spit "mess" out like the can with whole insects.

If you can get her to eat by free will that is of coure better. Try small crickets or coaches. Hold them so that they can´t run away from her. Feed her when she is calm so that nothing else cases her to loose appetite.... but you´ve already thought of this...


I must tell you that I have experience only from my first and one and only reptile - my little leo-girl who´s been with me for the past ten years. I´m not a veterinarian!! I you feel unsure my best advice to you is to consult a veterinarian.
My little leo refused to eat and got really listless when she ate sand. People here do keep leos on sand - the right kind of sand is considered quite safe for non-sand-eaters. My leo turned out to be a sand-eater and got sick during her first year with me. But she never got so sick she kept her eyes closed. Then I would have called the vet.
She´s survived and has been healthy ever since.

I also want to warn you about force feeding a leo that is constipated... It could make things worse.


About poop. I too worried about the liquid part in my leos poop until i read that there actually are tree parts in it - the black part that is the actual poop, the white part that is urine and the liquid part that I´ve found no explanation for... but it´s normal. ...but messy and bad smelling poop is not normal. That´s a big warning for parasites. However - after eating Zophobas a normal poop can be a little bit smelly and still be normal. I guess that´s because Zophobas are quite fatty.
If there is no black part maybe It´s because they had nothing in their stomach to poop. They just peed.


I´m also thinking - maybe you should part the leos. If the weaker leo Is an easy pray for bacteria or paracites... maybe they could get so many that they overwhelm the other leo too. I don´t want to anticipate that bad things will happen... but if it is possible it could be a good precaution.

I hope your leos will get well very soon.

 

[Nooon]

About the temperature - I would raise the warm side as much as possible. I´ve learned that warmest temp a leo can have and still be comfortable is 35 C (=95 F). The higher temperature will speed up the leos digestion and help them combat possible disease. Check the temp inside the hides and on the UTH making sure the leos can´t get overheated.
My leo need 25-26 C (=77-79 F) on the cool side and 32-35 C (= 89-95) on the warm side. Cooler temps makes her inactive and loosing appetite.

...and don´t feed the insects and worms with too much sugar (aka fruit). The bacteria in a leos stomach also likes sugar... and we like to starve them as much as possible. Veggies are good!

...and I´ve learned that meal worms are hard to digest... maybe you should not give them to the sick leo just yet. Yesterday i read on another forum about deadly constipation possibly caused by meal worms. Two juvenile Crotaphytus collaris died.

 

[mörten]

OZS, any updates?

 

[jaredricha]

The 2 geckos can not like each other which can cause stress. Try separating them.