Help Needed - Central Netted not Eating

[Cloudgirl]

Hi

HELP HELP

I recently brought a pair of Central Netted Dragon Hatchlings as my first adventure into reptiles. I have had them a week. One is not eating at all and seems very stressed, running at the glass, whilst the other is very happy and comes to take food from my hand at feed time.

I have been feeding/offering mini mealies, small crickets dusted in repti cal & a salad mix of grated carrot, apple & zucchini. I have tried seperating them and doesnt make a difference.

My heating is 100w basking globe and a night glo 100 watt both operate offf a B1 Thermostat set at 35 day time and 30 night time. I have a compact with two 13 watt UVB10s. My Terrarium is 900x45x45 glass with mesh top.

What am i doing wrong??? How can i get the little guy to eat?? How long can he go like this? He is drinking water.

Any suggestion greatly appreciated as we are all stressing that we are going to loose him and the shop where i got them from is of no help at all. I have just order the Central Netted Dragon book by Shannon Plummer and its on its way hopefully.

Cheers
Kerry

 

[bigi]

Kerry, in my opinion there are many things you need to change to ensure your little critters are recieving the best possible attention. Why it is not eating maybe due to multiple reasons, so you need to correct the general enclosure conditions and nutrition and also look for other symptoms to narrow it down to a particular problem.
Firstly what size is your enclosure and what is your substrate.
Secondly have you observed any other conditions such as diarrhoea, constipation, swollen guts or limbs.
what sexes have you got, and how are they interacting.

 

[butters]

So are you saying that the shop has offered no advice at all? What did they say?

As well as the questions above.

How long did you seperate them for? 1/2 day, 1 day,2 days etc?

Have you asked the store what they were feeding them before you bought them? Are you feeding the same foods or something different?

Do you have any hides? Somewhere they can get away or at the very least out of each others line of site.
I personaly do not heat any of my enclosures at night time to give a more natural temperature range. Where in the enclosure are you measuring the temp? Near the heat source or away from it?

Sorry for the thirty questions but we need to know the answers to some of these to be able to give suggestions.

Cheers Andrew

 

[bigi]

dont feed too many mealies, they are probably a sometimes meal, continue to offer dusted crickets and woodies and ensure they are small enough for them to eat reasonably quickly, sometimes a smaller meal will seem more attractive and too hard too refuse. Ensure your calcium suppliment is phosphorus free. Change the salad mix to only Boch choy, dandelion leaves or hybiscus flowers.
Does your hotspot have a rock or element that will hold surface heat. your hotspot should be around 40 to 44 degrees with the cool end around 25, i aim for the cool end to be no lower than 17 at night, and no hotter than is necessary too maintain the 17 at the cool end.
i would remove the 2 compact uv globes immediately as the judgement on these is still out, until further testing and can be harmfull, this then means you need to decide on whether you use uv tubes with your current heat globes or go with megarays and night lights, i hope i havent confused you. i will say have a good read of the book, and ask questions if you are unsure, good luck

 

[camt44]

yeh don't feed mealworms, they're no good... it could just be a settling in thing, mine took a good 2 weeks to be fully eating... are the temperatures at the basking spot at the temps bigi said, 40-44? if its too cold they won't eat, too hot and they won't bask... just keep on offerring food and they'll come around

 

[Cloudgirl]

Hi again

Thanks for the replies - lost internet access for a few days due to moving house. to answer some of your questions..however i took the smaller dragon back to the shop after 7days of not eating and they have taken him back and exchanged it for another. The little one was just looking so thin, skin sagging and never came out of the hide and i couldnt stand it any longer. They have started force feeding it. I now have two that seem ok and both are eating crickets & minni mealies.

Enclosure is 900x450x450 glass with mesh lid

Substrate is Dessert Sand - thicker in some places for burrowing but genrally about 4inches deep

Have 6 different hides, one bark, two plastic & one herp hotel made out of stone which they both prefer to be in together as well as basking on

No signs of diarrhoea, constipation, swollen guts or limbs on the little one were evident as the feaces seemed same as other one.

Sexes - unsure as they were too young to tell, however the new one i came home with does a lot of head bobbing & hand waving so am assuming its defiently a he Both sleep & bask togther and come to feed from my hand.

RE: The shop - i rang on 4 occassions and got little or no advice other than its just settling in, maybe its a little stressed or maybe i should take it to a vet. After the last comment i stated maybe i should bring it in for them to look at and thats when they agreed it needed feeding up and seemed healthy otherwise. I had done exactly as they advised re: feeding & setup, asked a whole list of questions re: diet, time they were being fed, how much they were eating, how often etc i fed exactly the same diet they sold to me, which was daily feeding of a bowl of mini mealies ( about 20) & dusted crickets 3-4 each and grated carrot, apple & zucchinni.

I had seperated them initially for feeding but then for different periods but nothing changed in the troubled ones behaviour

Re: Heat - i have a B1 thermostat running the basking light and two thermometers one at each end of the enclouse, hot end at base level is 35 and cool end is about 26 - they can climb a to a spot 15 cms away from the heat source and they seem to stay up there most of the day - ive not measured exactly under the light at that height.

I have read the book cover to cover lol and feel much more confident now - but so much to learn

i will look into changing the lights over, and was also advised to get a heat mat but jury is still out on this one.

I know i probably gave up on the little one too soon but i couldnt stand watching him die in front of my eyes so am a bit of a wimp there lol

thanks for all your advise as a novice lauching into the world of reptiles it is so valuble to get the real stories. Hopefully they can settle and grow now. Am trying to find dandelions but am not keen to just pick out of someones yard in case of pesticides. i will also stop the mini mealies as they are taking crickets from my hand but not hunting them yet.

cheers
Kerry