dishay

No, of course didn’t think putting the food on his head would help him eat. I balanced the raspberry there for just long enough to get the photo while he was laying still, before offering him pieces of it.

As for the paperwork from my vet, I got it yesterday and was shocked. The page they gave me was one I had never seen before. Dr. Talbott marked everything as normal, and only down at the bottom did he note that my skink was thin at his pelvis and neck, had runny and frequent stools, and was lethargic. However, in the visit, he was telling me how thin my skink looked and how he thought the marks on my skink looked like burns. At my last visit (for my crestie), he apologized for the loss of my skink and told me “Something was not right. He was sick before you got him.” However, the paper did list everything as normal?? The only thing he told me to do was boost my belly heat and cover a portion of the tank to keep the heated air circulating to ensure the skink wasn’t breathing air that was too cold. I did both (covered half of tank top, added UTH) and my temperatures and humidity were (still) in the same perfect range at all times up until my skink died. The vet also had written on the paperwork that the issues had been going on for “a few weeks” when I had explicitly told him the exact number of days I had the skink (less than a week at the time of the appointment).

I am so bewildered and embarrassed, and am doing a lot more research into this vet and other vets, even if it means I have to drive an hour to each appointment. I do, however, still believe something was wrong with my skink before I purchased him. My vet did no internal exams or fecal tests, just visually inspected him. As has been said many times, blue tongues are hardy and nothing at all happened in the week I had him that would cause death. He was offered healthy food in a environment with perfect heat and humidity, and was handled very very minimally. Same with Laurendalee’s skink; I cant imagine a “bulletproof” “fat garbage disposal” could go from perfectly healthy to dead in 20 hours unless it was outright poisoned.

However, because of the issues with the vet, I cannot definitely say William was responsible for the death of my animal. Personally, I will not support him further for my own peace of mind and because I do believe there was something wrong with my skink, but I have no hard data to support it.

I apologize to everyone, but I refuse to continue speaking out without evidence other than suspicion. I plan on trying another vet even though I took my Crestie to Dr. Talbott and he is doing beautifully. I know the much more experienced keepers here will make their own informed decisions about whether or not William is a reliable breeder.