Perseverance pays off: Tale of a survivor!

My hatching season was going well until about the middle of July. All the babies hatched out great, active, and healthy, until one weekend. A little baby hatched out and she was in rough shape. She couldn't open her eyes, had extra skin between her thighs and ankles (think crested gecko legs), and appeared to have breathing problems. Worried dearly about her, I placed her in her own special quaratine shoebox so I could give her special care.

For a whole month I spoon fed her apricot baby food mixed with JurassiCal and T-Rex's crested gecko diet. She would eat, but not enough, at least in my opinion. A whole month went by. She didn't grow at all, and she really showed no improvements. I was worried about her quality of life, and was going to euthanize her via the refrigerator method. I couldn't bring myself to do it. She was trying so hard to stay alive. She tolerated the feeding sessions and even let me douse her eyes in saline solution once a day.

Then one day, I open the tank to give her a feeding, and there she was, jumping around, and LOOKING at me!! Her eyes were both open, and she could see! They're a little malformed, but they work! She ate her first mealworm right from my hand and began accepting crickets the next day. I was so excited!

Once she got enough weight on her, I decided I had to do a little surgery and clip the excess skin on her back legs. The skin was causing her cloaca to bleed whenever she lunged for a cricket, and I was worried about serious bone and muscle deformities in the legs and hips if I left it alone. So, I went ahead, got my sharpest pair of scissors, and snipped the skin. She wasn't happy for a few days, but now she's running around like a normal little gecko!

I just thought I'd share this success story with you. I hear so many sad stories in here that it's nice to hear about a little one making it! It never ceases to amaze me how incredibly resilient leopard geckos are!

That is awesome. your patience and love for the gecko is a good thing to hear

I LOVE success stories like this!!! Sounds like you have as strong a will to give her a chance at survival as she does to survive! Please post pics of this special little gecko...

I am so glad you gave her a chance to live and helped that little one out so much! Its nice to hear about one that is given a chance and pulls through!

She is a luckly little leo to have you to help her out!

Vanessa,

What a great thing you did! That is one very lucky gecko! It made my day reading this thread. I can't wait to see a picture of the real "Survivor"!!!!

What a great story! I'm so glad she's doing well now! She sure is a lucky little gecko!

Nancy

Thanks everybody! Here are some photos of her. You can see that both eyes are sunken in and set too far back in her head. I'm amazed she can see, really. I think her eyelids are a bit strangely developed too. I also took a relatively bad photo of her butt (sorry for the invasion of privacy, little girl! ) and put in arrows where I snipped the excess skin. I probably could've clipped a little more, but I figured playing it conservative was probably best. The incision healed in only 3 days, and I'm really glad I did it. Her right leg was extremely weak because she had been using the tension the skin to move it instead of her muscles. It was basically acting as a rod holding the two legs together. When one leg moved forward, the other moved back involuntarily. Now she can lunge at crickets with the ferocity of a true leopard!

Without further ado:

It warms my heart to hear of someone who truely cares for the animal
weither it can breed or not. She is one lucky little girl.
I must say I have found more true "animal lovers" among the breeders
here than on any other herp site. That is why I stay here.

Ginger Ambrose

This is the best thing that I have read on this forum in a long time. Thank you for sharing your story and most of all for saving that little leo.

WOW! Thats awesome that she`s doing so well now !

I swear i would be to 'chicken' to cut the deformity away myself , but looks like you did a great job . Congrats !

So the legs were connected w/ another peice of skin going across ? Just wanted to make sure i understood what you meant .