Female Leo losing nails/skin problems

Bruce

New Member
Messages
8
Location
USA
Hey folks,

Thanks in advance for reading this rather lengthy post and providing any help/advice you may have on the matter.

I've been noticing a slow degradation of the health of one of my females. Although it doesn't appear to be life threatening at the moment, I want to make sure it doesn't get there. Here's the situation:

Over the past couples months of so I've been noticing her skin get a bit pale and slightly blotchy, generally not as healthy looking. Although her behavior has not been lethargic - on the contrary, she seems a bit more alert and on edge. The past couple days, I've noticed some missing nails, which is not a result of a bad shed - I've been careful to remove any left over skin on the toes. It even appears as if the skin of one of the digits of her front right foot is receding/has come off for some reason, exposing more of the nail than normal. Picture follows:
RecNail.jpg

She lost a nail last night and another one tonight. Both were bleeding at the time and were obviously fresh. I have not seen her biting at her toes, does not appear as if she is doing it herself:
NailHang.jpg

A picture of her terrarium:
20200220_220918.jpg

Specifically, she lives in a 20 gallon tank with 2 warm hides (Redundant I know, there was an extra) and a cool, moist hide. Flooring is stone slabs with very light dusting of sand and coco fibre (not nearly enough that impaction would be an issue). The warm side is heated with a heating mat under the cage and a heat lamp. It's winter here in MA so the temps and humidity are on the lower side but I'd say they don't drop below 68 degrees and 20%, respectively, in her cage. I spray down her cage once to twice a day to bring the humidity back up. Currently her diet consists of 5-6 gut loaded and dusted mealworms every other day, occasionally a waxworm as well. 10 Crickets once a week or once every two weeks.

Tonight I did notice one of her recent stools had bubbles on it, which could be a cause for concern:
20200220_221701.jpg

Lastly, she's around 4 or 5 years so old age isn't a factor. I just changed the flooring to paper towels and cleaned her cage/everything in it just to eliminate any potential hazards in her environment. Are these symptoms familiar to anybody? Might they be of a certain illness or condition? Will be taking her to a herp soon but wanted to get some insight from the community.

Thanks again!
 

acpart

Geck-cessories
Staff member
Messages
15,118
Location
Somerville, MA
I don't think the bubbles in the poop are cause for concern. It's probably just the liquid that came out and the fact that the poop was put on top of other poop. I wonder if there's any chance she scraped her toes up on your original substrate, or bit herself when she was biting off shed on the toes. The paper towel substitution may help in that case. I use ceramic tile in my cages which is smoother (but textured enough so the geckos don't slide around). I wouldn't recommend spraying the cage because I think it's too much humidity for a leopard gecko (I only spray my crested and day geckos once a day); the humid hide is probably sufficient. I'm also in MA, so I know about forced hot air heating and the humidity issue. If you're in Eastern MA I can recommend a few vets, so feel free to PM me.

Aliza
 

Bruce

New Member
Messages
8
Location
USA
I don't think the bubbles in the poop are cause for concern. It's probably just the liquid that came out and the fact that the poop was put on top of other poop. I wonder if there's any chance she scraped her toes up on your original substrate, or bit herself when she was biting off shed on the toes. The paper towel substitution may help in that case. I use ceramic tile in my cages which is smoother (but textured enough so the geckos don't slide around). I wouldn't recommend spraying the cage because I think it's too much humidity for a leopard gecko (I only spray my crested and day geckos once a day); the humid hide is probably sufficient. I'm also in MA, so I know about forced hot air heating and the humidity issue. If you're in Eastern MA I can recommend a few vets, so feel free to PM me.

Aliza
Hey Aliza, thank you for your reply and tips! Yeah I'll PM you in a sec
 

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