Ashley Clifford
Bearded Dragon Egg
- Messages
- 16
I feel I did everything right, but one day my 18 month old beardie woke up with a black beard and seemed almost puffed up. I took her out when she didn’t budge at the sight of her morning salad topped with a couple dusted superworms. I gave her a warm bath because she had been pooping weekly lately, so I thought maybe an upset stomach from having a big poo built up. She pooped a small amount but she remained lethargic basically laying down flat for the black beard and her eyes almost had a slightly sunken look although she was looking very good up until the night before with zero sunken look (I thought maybe she was wincing causing the sunken look as if may be constipated or in some sort of pain because actual synchronize would not just happen immediately, or overnight in this case). Up until the day before, she was taken out daily and just the day before she was very spunky wanted to Climb up and on my shoulder and continuously insist on climbing my hair to the top of my head,(of course I always kept a harness on her for safety in case she ever jumped). I called my regular Exotic Vet but of course realized it was Sunday and they were closed and I did not know of an emergency vet that would see exotics and after calling around to everyone, realized that I would have to travel to Boston Massachusetts but luckily it’s only a 3 Hour Drive, so I am mediately left with her. About an hour and a half into our drive she started arching her neck almost as if gasping but wiggling her body a little at the same time making me think maybe she was struggling to poop, but after doing that was much more lifeless and so I believe it could have been a seizure of some kind. Her breathing became shallow as we got closer and when we arrived I was not positive if she was still alive. They immediately rushed her out back where they hooked her up to a Doppler to detect her heart rate in which they were unable to find and declared her deceased on arrival. This all happened a couple of weeks ago and I am struggling with it because I absolutely love caring for and attending to a bearded dragon and without knowing what happened or why she passed away at such a young age hesitates me greatly on getting a new baby. Her vivarium is a 4 x 2 x 2 from Dubia roaches her lighting is an inside mounted 34 inch 12% Arcadia UV bulb ( scheduled to be replaced in December ) and a clear basking bulb mounted on the inside on one side of the tank with a basking rock just below it. Her substrate was tile with hides on both side of the tank and a hemp hammock on one side which was the cool side. I had two digital probes one on each side as well as an ambient and humidity reader in the middle the temps ranged from 95 to 105 on average on the warm side and around 75 on the cool side. Her diet was mostly kale topped with bell peppers and occasionally raspberry or blueberry and super worms dusted with calcium and vitamins twice per week. She was a very active dragon even when just basking she would sit above my chair in the living room in a big window and stand up tall in the sunshine while watching TV pretty much every morning. There were never any signs that I saw that indicated anything was wrong. I am asking this community because of the experience with these creatures to see if there’s anything I may have done wrong or if it’s possible this was a freak thing I just don’t know and it breaks my heart but if I did do anything wrong or could do anything better I would want to know before getting a new dragon.
