Saving Mona; A Recovery Thread

[basedonfact]

Welp. First I told myself I wasn't a reptile person, but when nobody wanted to adopt Roland because of his missing toes... I stepped in.

And now I've gone and done it again. This is Mona.

Mona came to Petsmart with a severely wounded leg. Not sure what happened. After a trip out to our amazing exotics vet, it was determine that with her current tiny size nothing could be done. The leg had no feeling, and the lower half was already starting to atrophe. It would likely fall off. She was too tiny to treat, so the vet said she'd need to be carefully cared for until she is large enough for treatment, though in reality her foot would probably die or fall off and at that point nothing could be done anyhow.

... Well, darn. I went in to check on her a few days ago, we are basically just making sure she is well cared for and monitoring for signs of infection. And she JUMPED up from her basking spot and tried to escape!

An injured, sassy dragon in need of long term care? Gosh darn it. I've got a spare 40 gallon. I'll take her.

I intend to post regular updates following her progress in this thread. I am currently considering her a foster (My house is really not big enough for another long term pet, but my guess is that we'll fall in love with her enough to make it work.) Right now, she's in a little 7-gallon terrarium, my next smallest tank is a 20g long and that will be way to big for her to find her prey. Her official weight-in and measure will be tomorrow, but at the vet a few days ago, she weighed in at a whopping 8 grams, and is just under 3" long.

I'm open to advice for her. I already anticipated having to feed her either stunned crickets or crickets with tweezers, but she is having NO problem catching them! She's such a spitfire. Her cage setup is a little silly, I realized after getting home that there was no way I can fit any of the ornaments I have in a cage that small, so I'll be getting her some better equipment tomorrow. For today she's toughing it out with just a UVB bulb and a small UTH. It's ok, it's almost lights out time anyhow

Here she is in comparison to Roland, who is still a young man himself. Roland has very few back toes and is missing most of his tail, and can not jump at all... And since he's my first dragon, I jumped myself when I saw Mona leap in to the air! I had forgotten what great jumpers they were.

(Don't worry, there is a piece of frosted glass between the two tanks. The light passes through, but they can't see each other.)

I hope you all enjoy watching Mona's progress! I've got my vet on speed dial if anything unexpected crops up.

 

[gilliesexotics]

Hi, that is wonderful of you to take this little one in.

The vet is saying she is to young to treat is #$%^ and honestly it can be done. Diluting antibiotics like baytril is super simple to do and topical treatments are as well.If you dont mind me suggesting soaking her limb in providone iodine to help stop the progress. If the tip of the injury becomes black you will need to have the vet amputate the limb.

 

[basedonfact]

Gillie, I agree that she isn't too young to do anything with, but I think his intention was more of "She has a high chance of dying if we try to do anything serious, you're better off waiting it out for a bit." We actually are doing an every-other-day soak for now in a medicated soak, but I'm not 100% positive what the soak is. I'll have to ask! We're also on high alert for any signs of infection, but while it looks bad, it's pretty clean. Since I'm not the one that talked to the vet, I don't have the full story. I do have quite a bit of faith in my vet, but know that everyone has different opinions, so I intend to do a lot more research about what might be able to be done for her and will continue to read any suggestions I'm still pretty new to the reptile thing, but she's got a new mom who is willing to learn and research and give her whatever she needs!

 

[gilliesexotics]

*Pats you on the back.
Shes in the right hands.

 

[basedonfact]

Alright, the numbers are in and the growth chart is started! In theory, she is 4 weeks old, so her make-believe birthday is July 1st.

As of today, Mona is:
7 grams, and 3.25 inches long.

(I doubt she has lost weight, the vet probably just has a better scale than I do. Hard to weigh things so tiny!)

She is an EXTREMELY enthusiastic eater! She has eaten three times today, eating about five small crickets each meal. She has not eaten any greens yet, but I know she'll grow in to it. She was offered a small bit of dandelion greens, a small bit of mint, and a very small bit of carrot. I take Roland outside every day for about half an hour to two hours depending on if I have a good book or not, and today after his outside I took her out! She only got to stay out for about ten minutes, I didn't want to give her too much stress, but I believe natural sunlight does wonders; She seemed to enjoy it! She's very nervous about being picked up, but is fine once she's out. She fell asleep in the sun today! I'll probably post daily updates for a few days, and move out to two or three times a week until she gets bigger. I'm excited to see how fast she grows, Roland was doubling in weight almost every week when he was a little guy!

She also bit me last night! It wasn't on purpose, I offered her first crickets last night and she wasn't interested, and I picked one up on my finger to show her; I didn't expect her to leap three inches through the air at it! I found it endearing. Her bad foot definitely has no feeling, and is stiff. However, she still uses it as opposed to just dragging it about. She has mastered jamming it in to small crevices to hold on to things, and actually leans her little head on it to prop her chin up!

 

[Germ]

But I would get it into a much larger enclosure ASAP, the proper heat gradient can not be achieved in a 7 gal. Providing that you keep furnishings to the absolute basics, not providing many obstacles & hiding spots for the feeders, it will do just fine in a larger enclosure.

 

[basedonfact]

Germ, I actually moved her in to the 20 earlier today. I wanted to be able to ensure she could catch her food before I moved her, so it was a short term solution. I still think the 20 is WAY too big, but I intend to offer a chance to feed in a separate enclosure as well as her tank just to ensure she's getting her food. I hope she grows fast!

Her leg is looking as good as it can. I'm not 100% positive what I should be looking for, but my guess is that the best case scenario is for it to dry and whither, so I am looking for any decay or necrosis-looking situation. As it is, there is a perfect divide between healthy tissue and unhealthy tissue, and that's the area I'm focused on to ensure the healthy tissue doesn't start to look unhealthy. Also watching for any swelling, since I know that can be a sign that things on the inside are rotting instead of just kind of drying out. I think she will likely lose everything below the elbow.

//edit

 

[basedonfact]

Little Mona is doing well! Right now, she's growing longer quickly but still not gaining a ton of mass. I'm not too concerned, she's healthy and active, but still very nervous. I'm sure the more she settles in, she fatter she'll get The last few days, she has just now starting showing an interest in salad. She really likes zucchini, and bok choy! She is eating a TON of food, so I'm sure we're gonna start seeing the weight gain soon. She is eating about 5 dubia nymphs and small cricket or two every day, plus her salad! Her daily soaks have been moved out to every other day, and she's adjusting well. She is currently going through her first shed since being here!

As of today, she is 3.75" long, and weighs 9 grams. She was 3.25" and 6 grams when I got her two weeks ago.

Her leg has made no noticeable change, but I think it'll be a few sheds before we get a clear idea of what's going to happen with it. She gets around great though, and she is FAST! She's still so fearful of coming out, so I am giving her plenty of space and time. Roland was already a big snuggle bug at her age, so this is a different experience for me for sure!

 

[basedonfact]

I also had to block off visual stimuli on three out of four sides of the terrarium. You see the plastic deflector I put on the back in the photo (still wanted the light from the window,) and there is some particleboard on the other two sides. Roland makes her very nervous (understandably,) and tried to stalk her cage when he comes out. Of course that isn't acceptable, so I moved her to the edge of the table and blocked off the sides that he could get to. Now he's showing a lot less interest, so that's great, and she's starting to feel more comfortable in her surroundings. She uses her WHOLE cage, all 20g. She's a very active girl, always exploring and licking everything. Sleeps in a different spot every day!

 

[basedonfact]

No photo today, but little Mona has some recessed shed going on. Her shed all went fine except for, of course, around her bad arm. It's not in the danger zone yet, just starting to look a little restricted. She's getting moved back up to daily soak and is under close supervision. If she appears to begin losing circulation, back off to her vet! Wish her luck

She as also decided that she no longer liked crickets, just dubias and bok choy. This is tough cookies for her, since I am out of tiny dubias! This is me getting sentimental, but now I'm more thinking she just hates me as opposed to being scared of me She willingly runs up to be and eats from my hands, but then hisses and runs if I don't come with gifts! Oh, little Mona.

 

[Pat B]

OMgoodness....What a wonderful person you are to take on such a challenge. She's a fighter and sounds like a keeper. Good luck!!

 

[monature]

Precious Baby Girl, keep us posted

 

[basedonfact]

I'm going to try to get some good macro shots of her leg today... It looks like she'll still loose a few toes, but probably not the whole foot, and definitely not the whole leg! It is healing FAR better than anticipated... I think maybe the vet didn't anticipate such a devoted caretaker Today, after three weeks of healing, a large scab covering much of her foot has begun to fall off. That was the moment of truth for me, to see whether or not what was underneath was going to be viable... And it looks like new pink skin! YEEEEEY MONA! She also has some pretty bad recessed shedding on her long back toes, and they're just too tiny for me to help her with it, so we're just keeping up on baths and giving her toes a light massage with a brush daily to help any way I can.

 

[basedonfact]

//edit - accidentally uploaded huge photos, fixed!

Alright, pictures of Princess Mona! Just in case you forgot, this is the day she came home...

I was pretty sure she would lose the entire foot, and maybe even the arm up to the elbow.

And now, today!

This is after three weeks of medicated soakings, cleaning the leg, picking off dead skin to make sure to retain as much circulation as possible. She still appears to have no feeling in the foot, and it can not move (I think maybe the bones in her wrist are fusing, but I don't have enough medical knowledge to say that with certainty.) However, her top two toes appear to have circulation, and that is supported by the fact that they actually SHEDDED! The bottom ones are still pretty bad looking, don't think they'll recover... But she also had some shed on the bottom of the foot with her normal shed, and under the big scab that fell off the back of her wrist during her soak today was healthy tissue!

Here, you can see how she uses it. It points pretty drastically inward, but she still uses it for balance and it doesn't seem to impede her.

AMAZING MONA! Keep it up little one!

 

[gilliesexotics]

P H E N O M E N A L J O B !!

Glad to see this. If it wasnt for you taking this on. This kid could have lost a limb.

 

[basedonfact]

Oh jeez, now everyone can see my terrible nail biting habit. D'OH.

 

[basedonfact]

Well, as of today, Mona has lost the worst of the 5 toes. The loss looks really good though, fresh clean tissue at the loss site. Great! What more could I ask for? She is extremely sensitive to handling today, thinking her foot feels funny or is a bit sore. She's also up to 10 grams! She gained a few g's fast at the beginning, I thought she was gonna be a moose, but now she's growing at a much slower rate than Roland did at her age, so now I'm starting to think she'll be a very dainty girl. Still a little early to tell.

 

[gilliesexotics]

Keep up the good work. Dont let the weight gain fool you. She may still turn into a beast

 

[basedonfact]

I am just really amazed with this girl. I think she's going to be able to go up for adoption MUCH faster than I expected; Right now, I'm thinking her 'up for adoption' date is going to be Oct. 1st. She's up to 12 grams now, and up to 4". She's currently eating about 25 dubia nymphs a day, and is just about big enough that she can start eating slightly larger ones, so that'll be nice

Now I'm trying to figure out how to go about finding her the perfect home once she's all ready to go. I'm so unsure about shipping reptiles, so I think I'll only adopt locally (or try to,) and wait to see if I have any luck before I start considering shipping her to a new home. Is it even possible to safely ship a reptile when it's colder out? I wouldn't be willing to put her at risk, and that's the big fear. It's hot out now, but it won't be for long.

 

[monature]

Just curious, where are you located?