Sick Beardie having 'fits'

[Gecko :)]

Hi All,.

A friend of mine has a beardie hatchie which seems to have fits,. I have never seen it but she said its tail & legs start twitching then his whole body shakes as though s/he is having a fit.
A few times after it has done this it lays on its back for a little while as if it is dead.

Although she dusts her crickets regularly,. I have been told this is calcium related?,

Just wondering if anyone else has heard of this type of thing happening.
Any suggestions?

Cheers Kelly

[dragon lady]

Could be too much calcium or not enough...tricky...or U.V
I had one hatched 2 wks ago...& similar problems.... fingers twitching
i put bub in a 5l container in the habitat...so it could regain strength...& not have to chase live too much
i raised the container to make sure it was getting enough U.V...
2 days later after i saw it have a drink it stopped breathing.....warm face washers & a de-needled small syringe i used to give it some oxygen...10minutes later it started breathing again!...little bugger!

eliminate .....check that the U.V is no more than 10-15 cm away
if its not eating enough ....
4-5 feeding attempts pr day...may not be intaking calcium that is provided
could use a liquid vitamin on the veg?

[Gecko :)]

Thanks very much for your reply Dragon Lady,.

I have told her to start using Sandoz instead as I have been told it has better effects then the powdered stuff

[Chris1]

if it is calcium related get it out in the sun for a few hours, that should help heaps.

does she have a UVB light fro it?

[luke.r.s]

yes it could be MBD (metabolic disease) which causes them to have fitts due to the lowering of the membrane potential can causing hyper exitability of the mucle fibers in response to nerve stimuli, it would also help if you included some basic enclosure set up info, UV light - how long ago the globe was changed.

their can also be congenital problems which cause fitting although these are rarer.

so checking the uv and mineral access and frequency. if feed diets high in some things (such as one of the acids present in asparagus) it can lead to toxicities and then nervous system signs.

anyway hope that helps somewhat but their are other people on here that can do i better job than i can and may have some more surrgestions

and as always if his concerned about it the best thing to do is talk to/ take it to a reptile vet

-L

[Miss B]

Exact same thing happened to one of my hatchies recently. The vet diagnosed a calcium deficiency and he's now getting Sandoz Liquid Calcium twice per day. No more fits. There's more info in the thread here: Beardie frothing at the mouth?

Does she have an adequate UV light? Without this, her beardie will not be able to process the calcium it is receiving in it's diet and no amount of dusting will help.

[dragon lady]

Miss B....twice per day.....?.... not using any other calcium ?

I use T-Rex Solar Drops...i pr week on my new hatchie
worked well for my Faith as well.....the brand new U.V was faulty which gave her the shakes