savannah moniter health problems

I have a savannah monitor that is about 5 years old. for the past 1 year and 3 months, I relied primarily on my dad to care for my monitor as I lived In the city next to the city my monitor lived in because I recently moved. I just have moved him to the city I live in now to discover that he seems to lost about half of his body weight, with a reduced size stomach and partial vision loss. I really want to see him get better. I plan to move him into our new houses backyard in the next 2-4 months. he is living in a 6x3x2. I know. small. but that's all I could afford. (it was free from my uncle) my dad kept on telling me he was feeding him eggs and I kept telling him to stop. please help me. he is eating but walks around with his eyes closed most of the time. he acts like he is on drugs. the thing I want to know most is is there any way to get his vision back? I know its bad because when I put my finger near his face, he wont close his eyes and I think its not gone because I tried shining a flashlight at him when he was sleeping and he opened them

If you are lucky, your monitor is suffering from severe calcium deficiency. Getting more calcium in him using dusted/gutloaded feeders (do both) could help, as could a calcium supplement available through your vet.

However, if your monitor has been living in a 6x3x2 his whole life, this is probably what is happening: http://www.savannahmonitor.net/gout/

Does he have swollen digits? That could indicate gout. More importantly than the cage size is the choice of substrate since this is the means to reduce their internal water loss causing gout. If he has been fed a large amount of infertile chicken eggs it could also be a biotin related deficiency. You could be dealing with a combination vitamin deficiency and dehydration. I would soak him every couple days in water(chin deep)and Gatorade to get him some electrolytes while you are addressing enclosure issues that directly effect his physical health.
Matt Schubarth

Originally Posted by Matt Schubarth

Does he have swollen digits? That could indicate gout. More importantly than the cage size is the choice of substrate since this is the means to reduce their internal water loss causing gout. If he has been fed a large amount of infertile chicken eggs it could also be a biotin related deficiency. You could be dealing with a combination vitamin deficiency and dehydration. I would soak him every couple days in water(chin deep)and Gatorade to get him some electrolytes while you are addressing enclosure issues that directly effect his physical health.
Matt Schubarth

what do you mean by digits? and how does substrate affect internal watrr loss? hhe has.had 24/7 acess to water the whole time though. he wont eat rodents or insects so i feed him turky. and gatorade? u sure? whats the gatorade to water ratio

Digits are fingers, toes.

Savannah monitors need a minimum of 18" of substrate to burrow in to avoid dehydration. Their primary means of moisture loss is through respiration... every breath they take, they lose water. If you want to keep them from dehydrating, they need to be breathing in as much water as they breath out. They don't drink enough water often enough to keep hydrated. To keep water in them, you must have deep substrate that is moist at depth that they can burrow in to in order to breath that thick, humid air.

As your cage was only 2 feet tall, you can't have had enough dirt in there for him to NOT be dehydrated.

Unless your turkey was mixed in a ratio of 2.5 lbs lean turkey:22.5 grams bone meal: 0.5 regular centrum tablet, your diet was VERY high in phosphorous and almost completely lacking in calcium. MBD is a possibility too.

You monitor should eat anything you put in front of it. My savannah monitor has stolen fruit that was intended for other animals (and that he wasn't supposed to get to).

Ditto on the above. You have said he has difficulty with his eyes even opening, sounds like severe dehydration for sure but unless his humidity requirements(65) have only recently not been met it could be a temporary problem. If you decide to try the soak I use a 10-20 percent solution of Gatorade added to water that is about the air temp of the enclosure.
Matt

Since your cage is only two feet tall, obviously you won't be able to get the required soil depth for a breeding adult. Ya go to war with the army you have, right? You could get to a foot with a litter dam if its front opening. Loam soil is best with maybe a preference towards sandy loam. That would be soil with sand(and water) added until you can make a snowball with it. I like to add organic mediums to the loam like unmilled sphagnum and a little orchid bark, this helps the soil profile hold moisture better and if done right form.
Matt