I've had her a year. when I first got her from store she was impacted from improper bedding. I took her to vets and after 3 months of treatment she passed impaction. unfortunatly, it was severe and from the pressure on her spine her back legs are permanantly paralyzed. She has had numerous tests, x-rays, I would not allow anything invasive(no enemas!) She doesn't have metabolic bone disease, eats well, gets around as well as she can with her front legs, is on paper bedding, is fed veggies like bok choy, LOTS of different greens, dandelions, carrots, grapes, zuchinni etc. I give her a large variety of fruits and veggies with a base of mainly leafy greens as mentioned above. The vet says she can't find anything wrong with her, but she rarely poops! Once every 3-4 months and when she does poop it is huge! A section of the poop is white, the main part is black, basic poop color! I am worried about her. Oh, she does have an occasional mealworm as a treat, once a week. Does anyone else have this problem? Has anyone got any ideas? I am worried that she is silently suffering between bowel movements!
most peoples firtst reaction is MBD, his vet claims he soesn't have this after testing, and I do give him calcium dusting supplement. I do take him to a herp vet specialist but I am thinking of getting a second opinion.
That definitely isn't normal. You uro should not be waiting that long between bowel movements. The color of the feces you described is normal though, the white part is the basically an accumulation of indigestible minerals that they pass with the other brown poo and it's totally normal. I would be really worried about the infrequency of the bowel movements though. First thing I would check is your husbandry. Check your basking temps and make sure you have a good temperature gradient, 125F for basking temp, 98F on the "hot" side and 82ishF on the cool side. The high basking temps make a big impact on their digestive system and low temps can make your uro more prone to impaction and slow their overall digestion. Make sure to have a good temp gun to measure your temps. Next is diet, first stop feeding insects right away. Your uro is an herbivore and doesn't eat any insects in the wild, and they get all the protein they need from a proper vegetarian diet. Feeding insects only damages their kidneys and leaves them at risk of impaction from indigestible insect parts. Continue to feed leafy greens such as Bok Choy, Dandilion greens, Escarole, and Curley Endive and treats like squash and bee pollen. Did your uro get a fecal check for parasites when you took him to the vet? What were the results if you did? If you haven't had your uro checked for parasites I would definitely do that. Unfortunately you will need a fresh fecal sample so they can test it so that might prove challenging. Also, next time your uro goes for longer then 2 weeks without passing any feces I would take him to the vet for an xray to check for impaction. If your current vet isn't very knowledgeable with uro's or reptiles in general I suggest you do some research and find one in your area that is. Lastly go here and read all the info you can, lots of good stuff and it's routinely updated http://urowiki.filecore.net/index.php/Main_Page
