"Failure to Thrive Syndrome" in Leopard Geckos

I had a conversation on the phone this morning from someone who has several juvie albinos (his own stock) that are all doing very well except for one. This little 4-week old was eating very well on small crickets and little mealies until about two weeks ago, then just stopped eating. It is housed by itself and the environment is correct. I have no idea what the problem could be.

A few months ago, I sold an adult Patternless pair of breeders (proven) and a laying blizzard to a very good customer. The male had a bacterial infection last summer, and recovered nicely after 2 weeks of Baytril... his last fecal culture was normal. He was doing very well in his new environment, eating well and breeding with both females. Then he stopped eating, and began to lose weight, and nothing is showing on any lab tests. He has been removed from the females for quite awhile, and still is not thriving.

I know that often these kinds of 'unknown' problems get lumped into the "Failure to Thrive Syndrome", and never get resolved. There are many breeders and experts that actually claim to have never even had a sick animal (which I find very hard to believe), and I can understand how by admitting that they have had failures might be taken as a threat to their business, or ability to properly care for these particular geckos.

But, I honestly feel that by openly discussing these kinds of things we can learn so much from each other about our leos and these mysterious problems that elude us. I have always appreciated the breeders on this forum who have been able to do this. Any thoughts on the two cases I mentioned and/or "Failure to Thrive Syndrome"?

I have had a few that just plain refused to eat and ended up dying. Because of this, I've had to "harden" myself a bit. I wish we could figure this out. It is stressful to do everything "right" (and some things wrong out of sheer desperation) just to lose a critter. So, yes please...let's talk about it.

Does anyone have any suggestions, input, ideas, anything??

I have seen this also, one thing that has worked for me about 85% of the time is to give the gecko pedlyte for two weeks once a day.
Why this is going sorry no clue here.

I have seen this a couple times in two rescued geckos as well as three other friends geckos. In all occassions I placed the geckos enclosure near or infront of a window. I live in CA so temps are typically not an issue. My therory is the gecko needed some natural sun light. In all occassions the geckos began eating and had increased activity in a week or so. No other treatments were done.

So I wonder would or could a UVB help if a gecko if it starts going off food or if a decline is noticed? Should UVB be used as a supplement a few hours a day?

Good topic. I'm looking forward to reading what others have to say.

Joyce Brune

I don't really have anything educational or scientific to add to this discussion, but I do have a girl who doesn't seem to eat. She refuses meal and wax worms, pinkies, and sometimes crickets. I'm at a loss. I have had her treated for pinworms, which she is recovered from, but she seems more interested in playing and being handled more then eating.

I think she's just being a girl, and watching her weight, she manages to stay at a steady 44 grams, which is a bit dissapointing because I know if she ate, and ate alot, she would be a beast, her tail is fat, but can be fatter, and i think she used to have fat bubbles, oh well.

Ya, I'm done talking. lol

Michael

Joyce, I do believe that uvb light is filtered out be normal window glass. Therefore puting your animals in front of a window for uvb lighting would not work. If it is not someone please correct me. I do belive that 95% of uvb is blocked out though.

I have never used any form of artifical light on my LG's and have only used natural sunlight at times when they went off food. I now have a baby bearded dragon and the UVB seems to be the light of choice. I was wondering since the beardies are such sun lovers maybe this bulb better represents the suns spectrum? Not 100% sure but the beardie is growing like a weed.
Joyce Brune

I know that often these kinds of 'unknown' problems get lumped into the "Failure to Thrive Syndrome", and never get resolved. There are many breeders and experts that actually claim to have never even had a sick animal (which I find very hard to believe), and I can understand how by admitting that they have had failures might be taken as a threat to their business, or ability to properly care for these particular geckos.

Well, I am willing to go on record here stating that we do not get sick leopard geckos. We have only lost babies from two circumstances over the years:

(1) About one or two a year will seem to be unable to shed their skin after hatching, and never seem to pull out of it.

And,
(2) Every once in a while a baby will catch the "umbilicus" on something in the egg incubating container, sometimes causing damage to them. Depending on the severity of the damage, some may die from this, but not all of them.

We have NEVER had any babies just refuse to eat, or die from anything else. We do lose some adults from old age, damage inflicted from fighting with other cage mates, or sometimes egg binding in the females. But even that is a rarity.

Our leopards are keep in large rubbermaid containers stacked in a shelf, and they do not get any sunlight in any shape or form. Matter of fact, there are NO windows in my reptile building at all. Lighting is provided via gro-light or full spectum fluorescent lighting, but since these are suspended from the ceiling, it is doubtful that they have any effect, healthwise, on the lizards.

One thing to note is that our colony has been closed to the outside world since around 1997 or so, when we added a few of the patternless leopards. They were placed in quarantine for about a year. I have heard rumors of geckos being passed around that carried pathogens along with them, that when put into active colonies without strict quarantine first, completely wiped out those colonies.

Connie takes care of her babies, exclusively, leaving me with the corn snakes. She has decided to breed for personality, and has produced such dog tame, personable, leopard geckos that it is comical. She can actually pick out the lineage based on how they act. And will plan future breeding based on wanting to see how the babies will act from particular "characters" she has as favorites.

Now I have seen some really gorgeous leopard geckos other breeders are working with, and sometimes wish she had done more selective breeding towards appearance. But since she takes care of them, and gets a lot of enjoyment out of them, I let her have full rein on what she wants to do.

I have read that someone who had very similiar circumstances with her leopard geckos was able to trace the problem to her feeder insects. (Or rather who she got them from). It ws a very good point. Once she changed companies she didnt have a problem anymore. I am not going to name names of who the insect company was etc. Because this was her observation and I am not going to say damaging things about a company I personally know nothing about. BUT it is feasible for an insect company to have such filthy conditions that the animals being provided with the prey insects could become very ill from eating them. She made some very good points. AS well as the reptile keepers maintaining clean insect storage units!! Keeping stagnant , filthy cricket bins is only going to breed bacteria/fungi that can then be passed to your reptile.
MY .02
Shannon Richards LVT

I couldn't agree more about the feeders... especially since I lost 17 of 24 of my sick breeders over a period of about 6 months several years ago to mycotoxic poisoning from crickets that fed on moldy food. As soon as I switched cricket suppliers, I had no new cases and was able to save several sick geckos. (I know Webslave remembers this...) I also some had random bacterial infections last year which were also a result of crickets (I had the bugs tested at IDEX labs straight out of the box.) Again, as soon a I switched suppliers, I have had no problems.

The only reason I found this information out was because it was worth it to me to have necropsies (one performed by Dr. Frederic L. Frye, himself!) and in-depth lab tests done to get to the bottom of these problems when all other conventional tests showed nothing. But, these lab tests are expensive for most of us, so I can see why some people have 'unexplained' deaths and sicknesses.

Well, I am willing to go on record here stating that we do not get sick leopard geckos.

Rich, if you and Connie are among the few leo keepers that has never had a sick animal, then I believe you, and retract the "I find it hard to believe" comment. LOL! Not letting in other animals and closing them to the world may be the reason... but I'm curious to know what you feed your geckos and where you get them?