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Need help dragons dieing.

ace9916

ace9916

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I'm going nuts first I lost my super citrus female, then my co-dom A. Leather and then my leusistic, and now my hypo het trans. Iv taken them to my vet and even they are stumped on what's going on.

They don't show any signs of anything thing they look perfectly healthy till a few hours before death. I need serious help I'm scared i lm going to lose my entire colony. Any idea or someone I can turn to would be a great help.
 
I wish I could help you. The link that's posted above is a great one, however it's linked to the north carolina page. If you click on "Herp Vet Connection" at the top of the page, it directs you to the main page.

Anyways, their bodies should really be sent out to a lab for necropsy and pathology. Good luck.
 
You should look up some of the bigger sellers of qaulity Dragons and go over your Husbandry and Diet with them maybe one of them can Help here is a couple off the top of my Head.
Diamon Den.Thomas clarke.Rainbow Dragons.Kvongpha.Koi boy David to name a few Pm all them and ask as many questions as you can thats what were here for!
 
How devastating !! Get it to a good vet asap !Have him test it for the diseases that kill beardies. Armando,you should have a necropsy done if another one dies...it must be done by a vet that specializes in reptiles,someone from the list that Maia posted. Which dragon died first ? Who did you get it from ? What is your set up like ? Do you have anything in the tank they could be eating ? Fake plants,etc? What substrate? Even the " reptile calcium sand" can cause impaction...although I doubt that's it.Are you feeding any wild-caught insects ? Just some things to throw around. I hope you get to the bottom of this.
 
angie.h said:
How devastating !! Get it to a good vet asap !Have him test it for the diseases that kill beardies. Armando,you should have a necropsy done if another one dies...it must be done by a vet that specializes in reptiles,someone from the list that Maia posted. Which dragon died first ? Who did you get it from ? What is your set up like ? Do you have anything in the tank they could be eating ? Fake plants,etc? What substrate? Even the " reptile calcium sand" can cause impaction...although I doubt that's it.Are you feeding any wild-caught insects ? Just some things to throw around. I hope you get to the bottom of this.
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My husbandry hasn't changed in a few years. Its all run by thermostats and timers. 80-83 on the cool side and 100-105 on hot side.Night time temps are also run by thermostat as soon as my day time timer kicks off and the temps drop below 67 the second thermostat kicks in and keeps them around 70. No substrate only newspaper, no plants or decor. Feeders are live roahches dubias for adults and baby lobsters for the babies, supers, silks,and crickets of course their greens dusted with calcium, and vitamins.( Not everyday for each) Unless its babies thn they get more calcium then the adults.

Necropsy is being done to all the dragons.


Adenovirus has crossed my mind, and just hope thats not the case.
 
Helenthereef said:
I'm bumping this up hoping that someone who knows will see it. You should probably post more detailed symptoms/ vet reports/ photos if poss.

:(
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There very few symptoms what ever is going on its taking them down rather quickly with no warning. They ar fine one day and then i get home from work the fallowing day around noon and they are just laying there not moving much. They tend to just lay around opening and closing their eyes, mostly closed. They tend to stay away from the warm side and go to the cool side. The leusistic died an hour after seeing the vet.

There was a startling difference last night though my hypo het trans female did pass lat night. But she was very different and really scared me. I'm not sure but I'm thinking she died from some kind of internal injury or rupture. I gave her a warm bath just to go through all the bases making sure it wasn't an impaction. Or that she couldn't go to the restroom. I opened her mouth as well to check and see if she didn't have to much mucus in there, maybe hinting to a raspatory infection. I then noticed a spot of blood in her mouth, shortly after she through up a large amount of blood.
 
Ok sorry i'm trying to peace all this together plus do research on all the possibilities. As of right now the female from last night i'm not including her as part of the epidemic. She passed in a much different manner then the others. the others passed quickly but calm and relaxed almost as if they went to sleep and never woke up again, like if they were exhausted. At the time I started this post The fourth one was not gone yet but was showing similar signs as the rest. But when she did pass it was far different as i mentioned above. The only thing that i'm really hopefully for in terms of saving my collection is that there is a possible link to these dragons. It would really suck if so but I guess this would be better then adeno or any other kind of virus. The M. Leusistic female had just layed a clutch of 20 infertile eggs one week ago, female two could have possibly been gravid she was a breeder already. and the 1st female the super citrus could have had a possibility of having infertile eggs as well just never let them out. the First two are with the vet already but they haven't had time to do the necropsy yet. I'm waiting on the first 2 results to hopefully get a positive answer on if this was a bad case of egg binding or something related.

I don't know what she could have possibly have hurt her self on i dont keep anything in the cages that could hurt her. Feed her the same as the rest, but i'm guessing its going to be some kind off internal damage and bleeding. I didn't see any bite marks on her but that doesn't mean she didn't get into a fight with her cage mate. It would have had to have been a good bite to do such damage but every possibility is better then nothing right now. This one could have been bad timing with a different issue.
 
Did you recently bring in any new animals prior to this starting? If you brought in a animal that may have been a carrier of something nasty it is possible to run through your colony before you know whats happening.

Is this all centralized to 1 female colony?(since it seems that you house your females in groups)
 
The fourth one that passed was in a separate cage and was the oje that bled the other three were together.
 
So did you bring anything new into your colony in the recent days or weeks prior to this occuring?
 
YOu do not have to give away the breeder or anything of that nature but it is a possibility (depending on how thorough or unthorough your cleaning is between handling one set of dragons to another) that this dragon carried something nasty that spread and incubated in some of your other dragons via you as the carrier. I have seen people bring in a single dragon and lose their entire colony within 4 months. Good luck with the necropsies I hope the vets can find some info out for you (though their ability to find some things greatly decrease after the first 24 hours.)
 
I stay pretty to wash and disinfect between each handing but to say I'm 100% would be a lie. Accidents happen and certain emergencies as. Well so that is always a possibility and my fear.
 
Could the feeders (crickets, roaches, etc.) be carriers of something themselves?? Someone I talked to said they were told a few cricket farms were dealing with some sort of virus or infestation in the crickets. Not saying that it is 100% true but could it be a possiblity??
 
bubblesd1234 said:
Could the feeders (crickets, roaches, etc.) be carriers of something themselves?? Someone I talked to said they were told a few cricket farms were dealing with some sort of virus or infestation in the crickets. Not saying that it is 100% true but could it be a possiblity??
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I am not sure if it has jumped the "pond" so to speak but there was a very bad virus that was killing off mass numbers of the captive cricket farming colonies. If it has made its way over here I am not sure if it woull affect the dragons or not. Good thing to bring up though.
 
I heard about that its been affecting cali for awhile now. I heard that yes it could but no proof yet.
 
Probably the way to rule out crickets as a possibility is to name your cricket supplier...if others are using them with no problems then it's highly unlikely to be the cause.Also,you would have noticed sick/dying crix. And if the crix overseas were sick and people heard of it here,surely there would be reports of beardies getting sick as well as other lizards. I think that all the dragons have the same illness,just that one vomited a large amount of blood before dying whereas the others died with no vomiting. Hopefully your vet will have some answers...I'm really sorry that you are going through this.
 
This is just terrible! So sorry for your losses. Just throwing this out there... could you possibly be bringing something into your dragon area? Something on your clothing or body that may be toxic... perhaps from your employment?
 
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