# Inactive Water Dragon??



## roban2 (May 20, 2012)

My Chinese Waterdragon Maestro just had eye issues. He got a piece of soil caught in his right eye. I've actually got it out and all seems to be good right now. However, he's now very inactive and just wants to sleep most of the time and isn't eating or anything. I just got him about a little under three weeks ago and he hasn't really been eating very much since. I'm very concerned that he may be unhealthy. What can I do to make him start eating a little bit more and maybe be as active as when I first got him? Any help is appreciated! :mf_dribble:


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## Leeds (Jan 15, 2010)

Hey Roban. 

Chinese water dragons are known to be fussy eaters and I had one for 3 years before we found her a strapping companion in a gigantic new home. :2thumb:

Maestro's eye problems would definitely affect his mood.

Lets assume that you have the proper temperatures, light and humidity going because he's not going to be stimulated to eat otherwise. 

Not to get you paranoid but they are known to ingest soil/substrate while catching their prey. This can cause bowel impaction especially when young and result in lethargic behaviour. Lets also assume that your substrate is soft and sterile, and NOT anything sharp like woodchips. 

They're also known to hibernate, but I don't think this is the season for it.

My first line of advice to you is to show him to a specialist reptile vet. This is always the best thing, and should be done for any pets you have if you can afford it. If the matter is serious, you MUST refer to a vet. 

In the first few months of owning a CWD, I learned the hard way when she started to bleed while passing a stool. The vet at Hollyhouse surgery looked at her, confirmed through xray a woodchip (learn't my lesson there) in the bowel, and gave me a couple of things to try first before we thought of resorting to surgery. These were a thick lactulose solution and a powder of emergency nutrition. 

With a 1ml syringe, I fed her 0.2ml of the lactulose which was a laxative to help flush her system, and followed up an hour later with a couple of ml's of the emergency nutrition diluted in room temp water. Note that this took me ages to get used to. I first had to catch her, get her in a comfy yet secure position in my left hand (im right handed)...gently but securely hold her head between my thumb and index finger. With the syringe in my right hand, I had to gently pry open her jaws and drop feed her. THIS IS NOT for the faint hearted OR heavy handed people. You have to be extremely deft, delicate and precise to avoid injuring the animal. She didn't like the lactulose, but lapped up the emergency nutrition solution. Things eventually worked out: the chip came out and she returned to health.

After that, everytime she got fussy and stopped eating, I fed her baby food with the 1ml syringe. I had to squirt a bead onto her lip....she'd taste it and if good, would lap up whatever I gave her. A word of caution, don't use babyfood containing milk in the ingredients. The vet told me not to. Remember that IF/when as a last resort, you do feed babyfood, remember to include a little calcium supplement weekly. Most babyfood with calcium comes from milk products contained within and that's a NO NO. Weigh your lizard, remember how much he normally eats and add calcium dust according to the prescribed dose for a lizard of that size once maybe twice a week. 

Remember their native habitat is tropical, sunny, humid and slightly warm.....not grey, cold and damp as most of Britain is. I cannot stress how amazing properly installed MEGARAY lamps are. It's definitely worth investing in one...especially since you get a 6month/year long warranty on them. My CWD absolutely loved basking underneath one. 

When these lizards are happy, it most certainly pays off. 

I wish you good fortune in sorting things out. 

Mark


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## Salazare Slytherin (Oct 21, 2009)

Get a fecal test done, if hes not pooing your vet should be able to assist with that, not very expensive, as already said the layout of how you have the enclosure setup is also vital, today in the present the arcadia t5 setups are much better than Mvbs especially when placed on a reflector and work out cheaper in the long run too.

Personally for susbtrate I use a soil and bark mix, I am thinking of adding in some leadlitter and creating a bioactive substrate? some cwd are shy when offering food too, I know one of mine definately is he never eats in front of me, and one I rehomed to wilko92 definately was too (dunno about now), other than that you should seek a proffesionals advise to rule things out that may be causing it otherwise.

My own water dragons sometimes skip food one day depending on what they ate the day previously, I still offer it though.
I certainly would be checking temperatures as a start.

I think I recall your cwd eye thread?


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## roban2 (May 20, 2012)

He is pooping regularly it seems. I put him in the bath yesterday for about 20 minutes and he went in there. Since he hasn't eaten really since I got him, I softly got him to open his mouth and I put a mealworm on the tip and he ate it quick, and I repeated that 4 times. The way I get him to open his mouth is by touching lightly just below his jaw and he opens to try and bite whatever's doing it to him. Thanks for the suggestions, though. If he stays drowsy and depressed looking, I'll take him to the vet


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## henney2280 (Jan 12, 2012)

i would take him to the vets asap if you have to practically force feed him mealworms. water dragons love anything worm like and i have never seen mine refuse one. put it this way he usually has 2 adult locusts per feed then he wont eat anything else... but the other day my gf got him out after his two adult locusts and started spoiling him with mealworms i think he ate 20+ before she put him back. also if your water dragon is trying to bite you when you touch under his chin there is obviously something wrong, water dragons are very calm and mine will literally let you do anything and would never think of biting. are you sure its trying to bite you? when i got mine it had a mouth infection and the vet showed me how to get his mouth open to apply iodine, what you have to do is push (quite gently) under the mouth and if still wont open push gently in the same place with your thumb and move it down slighlty towards the throat but when i say be gentle i mean be gentle, this is what gets my CWD to open up.

but yeh if you CWD is trying to bite you when you do this, then it means 1 of two things, you have a water dragon that just dosnt like it and will bite out at you (i find this option hard to belive going on what ive read, and experence) usually water dragons will kick with there back feet or attempt to run away if something is irritating them. second option is your water dragon isnt well, and is bieng defensive because of this.

im not an expert but i do own a chinese water dragon and have had serious problems with him/her since i got it. id say get to the vets money comes and goes but its down to you to keep you water dragon healthy. it could be nothing, he could just be abit down and stressed from the eye problem, but if it was me i would deffo be getting a second opinion


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## Salazare Slytherin (Oct 21, 2009)

henney2280 said:


> i would take him to the vets asap if you have to practically force feed him mealworms. water dragons love anything worm like and i have never seen mine refuse one. put it this way he usually has 2 adult locusts per feed then he wont eat anything else... but the other day my gf got him out after his two adult locusts and started spoiling him with mealworms i think he ate 20+ before she put him back. also if your water dragon is trying to bite you when you touch under his chin there is obviously something wrong, water dragons are very calm and mine will literally let you do anything and would never think of biting. are you sure its trying to bite you? when i got mine it had a mouth infection and the vet showed me how to get his mouth open to apply iodine, what you have to do is push (quite gently) under the mouth and if still wont open push gently in the same place with your thumb and move it down slighlty towards the throat but when i say be gentle i mean be gentle, this is what gets my CWD to open up.
> 
> but yeh if you CWD is trying to bite you when you do this, then it means 1 of two things, you have a water dragon that just dosnt like it and will bite out at you (i find this option hard to belive going on what ive read, and experence) usually water dragons will kick with there back feet or attempt to run away if something is irritating them. second option is your water dragon isnt well, and is bieng defensive because of this.
> 
> im not an expert but i do own a chinese water dragon and have had serious problems with him/her since i got it. id say get to the vets money comes and goes but its down to you to keep you water dragon healthy. it could be nothing, he could just be abit down and stressed from the eye problem, but if it was me i would deffo be getting a second opinion


 
Mine refuse worms from time to time, it depends entirely how much they had eaten previously, if they are hungry they will eat, I wouldn't panic straight away from not seeing a water dragon eat, a healthy water dragon can easily go a while without eating a single thing.:2thumb:


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## henney2280 (Jan 12, 2012)

he has had him for 3 weeks and said he dosnt really eat, and also he said it used to be active and now its not. i know its normal for water dragons to become fussy, and sometimes they dont want to eat but for me this has never lasted more than 3 to 4 days. as you said water dragons can go upto a few weeks without eating but just because they can dosnt really mean that its normal, but to me this dosnt sound right, ... he said its drowsey, and not really eating obviously it could be tierd and drowsey because it isnt eating but i wouldnt disregard it and say its normal if there is a chance that it could be symptoms of an ill water dragon, usually the first sign people get that there animals arent well is when they are tierd alot and arent eating. your probs right salazare as to be honest i learnt pretty much everything i know from you, rthompson, and wilko. But this is the way i see it and if there was a chance that my water dragon was ill i would take it to get checked out as its better to be safe than sorry, its got to be better to catch something early insted of letting a water dragon be ill for 3-4weeks when you finally realize wait this isnt normal. thats my own opinion on the subject anyway


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## Salazare Slytherin (Oct 21, 2009)

henney2280 said:


> he has had him for 3 weeks and said he dosnt really eat, and also he said it used to be active and now its not. i know its normal for water dragons to become fussy, and sometimes they dont want to eat but for me this has never lasted more than 3 to 4 days. as you said water dragons can go upto a few weeks without eating but just because they can dosnt really mean that its normal, but to me this dosnt sound right, ... he said its drowsey, and not really eating obviously it could be tierd and drowsey because it isnt eating but i wouldnt disregard it and say its normal if there is a chance that it could be symptoms of an ill water dragon, usually the first sign people get that there animals arent well is when they are tierd alot and arent eating. your probs right salazare as to be honest i learnt pretty much everything i know from you, rthompson, and wilko. But this is the way i see it and if there was a chance that my water dragon was ill i would take it to get checked out as its better to be safe than sorry, its got to be better to catch something early insted of letting a water dragon be ill for 3-4weeks when you finally realize wait this isnt normal. thats my own opinion on the subject anyway


 
No mate your absaloutely right, I was just highlighting it isn't always the end of the world if your water d stops eating for a few days so it was just a comment based at you and not the issue at hand being as you said yours has never refused.: victory:

I alot of people really have in the past stressed themselves out over nothing, the beardie threads not eating veggys are a good example of that.:2thumb:

Reptiles are very capible of going hellishly long periods without food, something alot of keepers often overlook 
I hope you didn't think I was making an attack on you to prove you wrong, you are a responsible water dragon owner and give good advice, I have followed your posts from day one on here and you have learnt alot since and I wouldn't say otherwise, thats why I quoted you just as more of a discussion than anything.

Hope yours is all well though.


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## henney2280 (Jan 12, 2012)

Salazare Slytherin said:


> No mate your absaloutely right, I was just highlighting it isn't always the end of the world if your water d stops eating for a few days so it was just a comment based at you and not the issue at hand being as you said yours has never refused.: victory:
> 
> I alot of people really have in the past stressed themselves out over nothing, the beardie threads not eating veggys are a good example of that.:2thumb:
> 
> ...


i didnt take it as an attack on me i just didnt realize it was aimed at me i thought you were talking about the original post :lol2: yeh mine has refused to eat crickets and hoppers but has never turned down a mealworm unless it is literally stuffed and the reason it was turning down crickets and hoppers was because of a mealworm addiction he developed when i 1st got him and was feeding him what he liked the most (oops :blush now he (although i think it is actually a girl) rarley gets mealworms and usually the day after he is stuffed from them he wont want to eat. dont worry i didnt take it as an attack on me or trying to say my advice is wrong, i just wanted to say why i would take it to the vets, it wasnt the fact its off its food it more the lazyness and tierdness in conjunction with the lack of appetite that is worrying me. like i said salazare i learnt basically everything i know off you and a few others on here so i cant be wrong :notworthy: :2thumb: 

oh and yes mine is doing brilliant still growing stupidly quick has quite a belly on her now and is just about to start her 5th or 6th shed with me seems to be shedding like every 2-3 weeks. she seems to have a new friend that wants to eat her (mutley my terrier) he is OBSESSED with the viv its driving me insane :bash: but he dosnt bother her she just likes to sit and watch him with the odd confused head tilting. also my girlfriend got her out the other day and didnt have long sleaves on, lets say she looks like she has been attacked by freddie cruger lol she has scratches on her hand, wrist, arm and chest had to laugh :lol2: also she seems to be target trained to the bright yellow feeding tounges i use, all i do is put them near her and the tounge comes flying out and i litterally have to move them away before the gets a gobfull of plastic, i could understand if there was a mealworm on it but there isnt even anything in the tounges :no1:

im thinking about getting another in a month or so, need to get a holiday booked and out the way 1st then start saving for another CWD and start adapting the viv to suit but ive not decided 100% yet


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## Salazare Slytherin (Oct 21, 2009)

henney2280 said:


> i didnt take it as an attack on me i just didnt realize it was aimed at me i thought you were talking about the original post :lol2: yeh mine has refused to eat crickets and hoppers but has never turned down a mealworm unless it is literally stuffed and the reason it was turning down crickets and hoppers was because of a mealworm addiction he developed when i 1st got him and was feeding him what he liked the most (oops :blush now he (although i think it is actually a girl) rarley gets mealworms and usually the day after he is stuffed from them he wont want to eat. dont worry i didnt take it as an attack on me or trying to say my advice is wrong, i just wanted to say why i would take it to the vets, it wasnt the fact its off its food it more the lazyness and tierdness in conjunction with the lack of appetite that is worrying me. like i said salazare i learnt basically everything i know off you and a few others on here so i cant be wrong :notworthy: :2thumb:
> 
> oh and yes mine is doing brilliant still growing stupidly quick has quite a belly on her now and is just about to start her 5th or 6th shed with me seems to be shedding like every 2-3 weeks. she seems to have a new friend that wants to eat her (mutley my terrier) he is OBSESSED with the viv its driving me insane :bash: but he dosnt bother her she just likes to sit and watch him with the odd confused head tilting. also my girlfriend got her out the other day and didnt have long sleaves on, lets say she looks like she has been attacked by freddie cruger lol she has scratches on her hand, wrist, arm and chest had to laugh :lol2: also she seems to be target trained to the bright yellow feeding tounges i use, all i do is put them near her and the tounge comes flying out and i litterally have to move them away before the gets a gobfull of plastic, i could understand if there was a mealworm on it but there isnt even anything in the tounges :no1:
> 
> im thinking about getting another in a month or so, need to get a holiday booked and out the way 1st then start saving for another CWD and start adapting the viv to suit but ive not decided 100% yet


Great news and glad to hear he/she is doing so well  just had mine out in the sunshine for a couple of hours with the iguana, they all enjoyed it hehe.


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## roban2 (May 20, 2012)

Thanks for all the advice guys. Then main problem however, is that he really just seems to sleep 24/7 now, which I can't imagine is good. And I spent a good 2 hours looking for vets and the only one I found claimed to know nothing about CWD's. The nearest one is about 175 miles away which isn't a possibility for a few weeks due to exams all this and next week. I recently changed his terrarium from soil and peat moss to straight repti-carpet, but this was going on before the change. Have any of y'all had anything similar to this? I'm very concerned I don't want him to die :help:


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## Salazare Slytherin (Oct 21, 2009)

roban2 said:


> Thanks for all the advice guys. Then main problem however, is that he really just seems to sleep 24/7 now, which I can't imagine is good. And I spent a good 2 hours looking for vets and the only one I found claimed to know nothing about CWD's. The nearest one is about 175 miles away which isn't a possibility for a few weeks due to exams all this and next week. I recently changed his terrarium from soil and peat moss to straight repti-carpet, but this was going on before the change. Have any of y'all had anything similar to this? I'm very concerned I don't want him to die :help:


Where do you live?


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## roban2 (May 20, 2012)

A very secluded place called Markesville.


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## Salazare Slytherin (Oct 21, 2009)

roban2 said:


> A very secluded place called Markesville.


Never herd of it, tbh if your water d is ill you should seek a proffesional more near you or see if another vet will be willing to treat under specialist advice.


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## roban2 (May 20, 2012)

That's the problem, there's no vets near me


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## Howson (May 5, 2011)

I'm really sorry if this comes across as rude but it's not meant to be, I'm just talking straight.

Your CWD isn't getting any better. You NEED to take it to a vet asap or it will continue to decline in health. The longer you leave this, the worse it will get, until it's too late.

You are going to have to put the effort in and drive a long way to a vet that can help. It's unlikely it will just miraculously get better, it's going to need you to bite the bullet, and get it to a vet. This should be part of your decision when you choose to commit to taking an animal home and caring for it. It's really not fair on the animal to just keep leaving it.

You wouldn't leave a human family member to just lay and get more and more ill for exams, so why is it ok for an animals? Life is life.


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## Rthompson (Feb 19, 2011)

Hey there. 

Sorry if you've made another thread prior I've missed it, I can only recur one eye thread as of late and that one certainly wasn't a substrate thing.

For the sake of it can you do me a favour and just give me a quick run down of your setup, UVB supply, temperatures & humidity, what is the substrate itself? if he's pooping then it's unlikely it's a bowel impaction causing the issue.

Lethargy in a CWD can be caused by numerous things, some times it's often a case of pure stress and if you've only had him 3 weeks this could be a contributing factor, movement stress accompanied by the stress of a new owner trying to remove stuff from his eye.

I do agree that you need to find a vet, however your first and foremost priority is to get a fecal test done, fortunately these can be achieved online. Your best option for this is to contact Woodrott on here, Don't misunderstand what I'm saying here, I'm not referring you to him for CWD Advice, but he does know of an extremely good and reliable PALS Tester who I fail to recall the name of, they will send you something to put the feces in and you send it off, reasonably priced and great service. This will atleast get treatment / knowledge started.

My additional recommendations are the following:
1. Find a Vet, it can be frustrating but do not give up, if you can't find one who directly has knowledge of CWD's atleast find one who has a general knowledge in Reptiles, this may not be a species specific issue.
2. Check your temperatures, it may even be beneficial to increase them by around 3-4 degrees in general, a slight increase of heat can be used to temporarily bolster their immune system should an illness be occuring that you cannot see.
3. Check your UV Supply, if it's outdated and wearing down, the wrong type / not in the right position this can cause lethargic activity, with a CWD I'd recommend a 10% UV positioned 10" above the basking area.
4. Clean out the tank, completely remove everything, give it a good clean with F10 or a similar animal friendly disinfectant, use new substrate (Maybe better to just not put one in until you know what you're dealing with)
5. Replace the water supply and clean out any filters you have within it.
6. Try to encourage him to eat with the use of hydration baths, obtain either Avipro+ or Reptoboost, follow the instructions, put weaker solutions in the water supply until he starts eating and give daily warm baths in the stuff to help kick start his appetite / digestion.

Next step is to try and encourage him to eat in general, as discussed CWD's are extremely fussy, especially at young ages, they can be shy eaters and if you're tugging at his mouth to feed him until he tries to bite then this may be a sign of aggravation as oppose to not wanting to eat.

Give him a good varied supply as follows:
Put a few appropriately sized locust into the vivarium, they will hunt these throughout the day and usually when you're not looking, count what you put in and just have a count up every now and then to see what's missing, they thrive well in CWD enclosures so I doubt they will just die.

Put a bowl mixture of meal worms and wax worms in the enclosure on the ground floor, he'll see them as he moves around, I say both at the same time for specific reasons, they are great for protein / weight gain and usually both like catnip for water dragons.

3rdly, get a hold of some Dubia roaches, these things are usually a great way to start feeding again, if he ignores them when you try to hand feed, just put a couple in the enclosure or in a bowl, they are crap climbers.

If you have any questions, feel free to PM me.


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