Leopard gecko walking around with eyes closed

[pleasance]

Hello,

My leopard gecko has been acting strange recently, he keeps walking around with his eyes closed and barely ever opens them. He also doesn't go into the cool side with the cave that has moss in it, he'll just lay down next to the entrance. He used to go in there all the time.

Our temps are fine, we change the water and spray the moss often, and we feed him mealworms with calcium powder.

We don't really have any local reptile friendly vets, either

Thank you in advance!

 

[LeoMerlin]

What kind of substrate do you use, and what are the temps generally set, has he shed recently or look like he's about to shed? I've read that sometimes the shed skin can get on their eyes if they don't get it off by themselves completely. You have an UTH right? How many hides and what size tank is he in?

 

[tiedxupxinxknots]

is it a albino?

 

[fl_orchidslave]

Rather than members asking a bunch of questions, how bout filling out this http://geckoforums.net/showthread.php?t=70912 to give us a better idea what may be going on so we can offer advice accordingly.

 

[pleasance]

What kind of substrate do you use, and what are the temps generally set, has he shed recently or look like he's about to shed? I've read that sometimes the shed skin can get on their eyes if they don't get it off by themselves completely. You have an UTH right? How many hides and what size tank is he in?

He looks like he's about to shed now, kind of pale looking.

He's in a 15g tank, with an under the tank heater on. The warm temps are around 90F, and cool side around 70.

I'll add some extra information:

Age: about 11 months old, petsmart said the age was about 4months when purchased.

We don't handle him very often, about once or twice a week, and not at all recently due to the eye issue.

Fecal matter looks normal.

 

[LeoMerlin]

Sounds good except why is the humid hide on the cool side? I thought most were either put on the warm side, or in the middle to maintain proper humidity. I've heard that if you see a "film" over their eyes, that may be the shed skin, google that and see how you can fix it. I think I read somewhere you can use a quitip (however it's spelled) and some water (I THINK, DOUBLE CHECK THIS), and you should be able to wipe it off him. I am not a hundred percent sure on that one. My guy keeps his eyes shut (one or the other/varies) every now and then but not all the time and he has the right set up. I've checked myself to make sure there's no shed skin on his eyes, he seems to get it off on his own, but not all geckos are able to do that each time. What do you usually feed him? And how much/often? I give Merlin a choice of both crickets and mealworms, and since he's still considered to be young, I feed him daily.

 

[mango+cola]

Ive delt with several gecko's with eye problems of different characteristics. Ill explain what it looks like, and how to deal with it below and you can choose which one sounds more like your geckos problem.

I helped a friends gecko who had troubles shedding and frequently had shed stuck to its eyeball. This one is usually easy to spot, as there is shed generally around the outside of the eye, or the gecko opens its eye occasionally to try to lick off the skin on the inside of its eye. It looks like you would imagine, as if a small layer of skin were on the eyeball, and generally has rough edges or pieces hanging out of the eye. The easiest method is to first, wait a day to let it remove the skin itself, then give it a warm bath (fill a tub with room temperature water so that half the height of the geckos legs would be submerged, then leave it in the tup for 5-15min to encourage skin removal). If the skin is still attached to its eye, buy some plain saline solution (such as what is used in contacts...be sure its plain saline, no combinations) and dip a cue-tip into a cup of saline, then gently roll it accross the effected area until the skin dislodges or the gecko removes it themself (if it is stuck on too hard to remove it after a number of rolls of the cue-tip, leave it for a night to let the gecko rest, and attempt to remove it themself)

The second problem (which sounds more like you are describing) is a bacterial eye infection, which my own gecko has just recovered from this week. The gecko usually keeps the affected eye closed shut continuously, and after a week of watching my gecko not use this eye, it finally opened it one afternoon to which it was covered in a gooey film like substance (looking at it from a distance, it looks sortof like a caterac in a human). She was taken to the vet where we were given a very small tube of cream. She had this applied to both eyes (the other eye, although it did not look infected, had been as she transfered the bacteria from one eye to the other from her tongue) every morning and evening (2ice a day) for roughly 2 weeks. During this period, a very small amount of goop was removed from her less infected eye, while the heavily infected eye had all the goop gather in the center of the eyeball. Eventually (with the assistance of a saline cue-tip) the goop was removed (roughly 1 week into the meds) and after another week, she has both eyes open completly and there is no remaining residue. Make sure you continue medial doses even after the visable goop is gone (as it is bacteria, and even though the massive buildup is gone, even a small portion can reproduce and start the problem anew).

Hope this helps you with whichever your problem is. Make sure it is treated quickly with either issue, as if it is left for too long, they can become blind through bacterial growth with either problem. And even if it is the first issue, it is advisable that you see a vet if any problems arise.

 

[pleasance]

I took a picture of his eye, note that both look like this:

http://i53.tinypic.com/2nh17hh.jpg

I hope it helps, somehow.

 

[LeoMerlin]

What kind of substrate is that? It looks like reptile carpet, but tougher. Also what's the lighting set up in there? Do you use the blue bulb for day and a red infrared bulb for night so it won't harm their vision? Blue bulbs from what I've learned are safe for them, as well as red bulbs.

 

[pleasance]

What kind of substrate is that? It looks like reptile carpet, but tougher. Also what's the lighting set up in there? Do you use the blue bulb for day and a red infrared bulb for night so it won't harm their vision? Blue bulbs from what I've learned are safe for them, as well as red bulbs.

It's reptile carpet from petsmart, and I wasn't aware of the lighting about day bulbs. We purchased a kit from petsmart that had the red for night, and a normal warm color for day.

I don't think the bulbs have much to do with his problem, though. He's been having the eye issue no matter which bulb is on

I've sent an email to the nearest vet that seems to be herp knowledgeable, I was going to call but they were closed today. I think we'll take him to the vet tomorrow or friday.

 

[winwin]

Try turning off the lighting in his enclo?

 

[LeoMerlin]

It's reptile carpet from petsmart, and I wasn't aware of the lighting about day bulbs. We purchased a kit from petsmart that had the red for night, and a normal warm color for day.

I don't think the bulbs have much to do with his problem, though. He's been having the eye issue no matter which bulb is on

I've sent an email to the nearest vet that seems to be herp knowledgeable, I was going to call but they were closed today. I think we'll take him to the vet tomorrow or friday.

Hmm alrighty then, just hope it gets better soon.

 

[mango+cola]

I took a picture of his eye, note that both look like this:

http://i53.tinypic.com/2nh17hh.jpg

I hope it helps, somehow.

That looks like the second scenario i mentioned, where a small film of bacteria goop is building up on her eyeball. If it is left too long it can increase until the whole eye becomes engorged and begins to look like a goldfish (if it had eyelids which it kept shut closed all the time - when my gecko had this it never got that far, but when i was researching the problem those were the more serious scenarios, with loss of vision in the affected eyes).

I would suggest going to the vet asap and getting a prescription cream to spread onto her eye twice a day, if you cant get to the vet for awhile, like i said before...saline solution will lessen the spread of the bacteria. She will likely have it spreading in both eyes.

 

[Kat&Rin]

I was curious about what this might look like so I googled it and found this website. You might find it helpful or at least informative

http://www.azeah.com/Care-Sheets.asp?id=117

 

[pleasance]

Well, the vet was pointless. They said he's a perfectly healthy leopard gecko. Our leopard gecko is worse now, and he's very weak and lazy, and can barely eat his mealworms. His vision when his eyes are open is very bad, and he aims in all the wrong places when trying to eat.

His eyes sometimes look glossy, and we've seen some sort of material in his eye, it seems like it could be dead skin or something slimy. The vet did tell us to use saline solution on his eye and gave us some sort of gel to use around his eye, neither is helping.

I don't know what to do, he's suffering and it makes me feel terrible. I feel like I've done everything I can

 

[mango+cola]

Well, the vet was pointless. They said he's a perfectly healthy leopard gecko. Our leopard gecko is worse now, and he's very weak and lazy, and can barely eat his mealworms. His vision when his eyes are open is very bad, and he aims in all the wrong places when trying to eat.

His eyes sometimes look glossy, and we've seen some sort of material in his eye, it seems like it could be dead skin or something slimy. The vet did tell us to use saline solution on his eye and gave us some sort of gel to use around his eye, neither is helping.

I don't know what to do, he's suffering and it makes me feel terrible. I feel like I've done everything I can

The gell makes it look worse for the first week of doses, what it is doing is gathering all of the bacteria from the corners of their eye, and depositing it in the middle so that it eventually will be easier to remove. Dont fear, let it work in for a week. just make sure you keep doing 2 doses a day, one in the morning and one at night.

 

[gmaier19]

is the gel the vet gave you an antibiotic called terramycin? my gecko had an eye infection and i used terramycin and it worked really well. i hope your gecko gets better soon.