Shakey Tegu

tupinambis · Posted: Mon Sep 26, 2005 1:28 pm Post subject:

Not to be confrontationist, but sounds like your vet has limited herp experience. First, many vets make the claim that pinkies are a good source of calcium and vitamins, without checking that MOST studies counter that claim. Pinkies haven't yet mineralized their skeleton, and most of the calcium and vitamin content in them comes from their stomach contents - milk. Beings as reptiles are lactose intolerant, this isn't really a good source of these nutrients. It is far better to offer your tegu older rodents. Cut them up if you have to.
Second, most veterinary manuals equate tegus with monitors, hence their view that fruits are a hindrance. As we all know, wild tegus are omnivorous, and actually eat a fair amount of fruit. However, most keepers don't read these articles, and interpret "fair amount" to mean a lot more than it should. It would be my advice to avoid giving more than 20-30% of their diet in fruit.
Lastly, I'm a little surprised if your vet didn't recommend making sure your tegu has ample exposure to UVB radiation, or at least recommended supplementation with pro/vit D3. You can give your tegu all the calcium in the world, but without it also having vit D3, it isn't going to amount to much. Vit D3 is an integral component to calcium metabolism.
However, definitely keep using the oral calcium supplement. It is usually the best thing to give them.

drfish · Posted: Mon Sep 26, 2005 2:00 pm Post subject:

I was going to say about the pinkies, but I think Tup (excuse the abbreviation) has pretty well summed it up.

I'd recommend finding a new herp vet really.

BigLou69 · Member Joined: Sep 11, 2005 Posts: 33

yeh he also said that tegus and snakes dont need UV light. I was just like yeah ok. But of course im still using it. The only thing im having trouble with is getting him to take the calcium from the syringe, like he doesnt wanna lick it. I dont know why. But yeah im still gonna feed him crickets, turkey and fruit, as well as rodents. He ate 2 pinkie rats today and seems to like them. I havent seen any of the shaking latley so, lets hope hes gettin better. I love this little guy. Im prolly just gonna stay with this herp vet. Hes only like 10-15 minutes away from me tops, cause i live in fishkill, so I went to the one in Newburgh. But ill keep listening to you guys, cause aboviusly all of you guys have ahd alot of expierence, and as for the vet, well i dont know about him. I guess you could say he thought he was a "know it all" but anyways thanks alot guys, and if anybody can give me any suggestions on how to get him to take these drops, thatd help out ALOT too. Thanks

alex · Valued Member Joined: Aug 03, 2005 Posts: 106

Snakes don't need UVB light, that much is true. I've had well over a hundred snakes pass through my hands since I was 10 one way or another, and I've never had a hypovitaminosis D or skeletal problem that wasn't related to trauma.

Anyway, Colin already said it about calcium & neonate rodents, but if you have a big bag of pinks already, just powder them with a little calcium - if it has D3 in it use it more sparingly, or get some human tablets and crush them (I have some I bought for me that are disgusting, chalky and hard to swallow and so I tend to powder them for the herps & bird)

Another thing you can do is ensure that the greens and fruit you are feeding have a positive Ca:P ratio, if ever in doubt look up the nutritional data on:
http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/foodcomp/search/

If you have trouble using the oral Ca supplement, there's a few things you can do. 1) What flavour is it and what concentration of Ca is in there? You can switch around, drug stores usually sell a few different flavours and the veterinary stuff, at least in Canada, is much higher in Ca++ and banana flavoured. You may have to give more of a less concentrated solution if you can find an appetising flavour. 2) Don't expect him to lick it. Crack his mouth open, slide the syringe in past the back of his tongue (since the trachea is immediately adjacent to the tongue, if you're at the back of his throat you're in the esophagus) and squirt it back there. I don't know how many ml's you're giving per dose, but you may have to break it up (i.e. instead of 1 5ml bolus, give 5 1 ml boluses). This is much easier in some ways, but involves actually being able to safely restrain your tegu and open its mouth. 3)If it eats pink mice whole (i.e. doesn't rip them up or chew too much) inject the liquid supplement into the pink (or into 2 or 3, again, depending on dose). I don't know if you have clean needles & syringes around, but either ask your vet for them or ask at a human pharmacy. I've found Walmart to be quite good about giving me needles when I say they're for pets (I don't know why, but they are. You could probably just use something like 25 or 23 G needles on whatever syringe you have and use that to inject, but even an insulin syringe might work, but then you have to realise that a human insulin syringe is 30 units per 1 cc/ml or a caninsulin syringe is 40 units per 1ml/cc). I stick everything that is humanly possible in my prekilled mice for my snakes and the raptors.

Finally, if you still can't get it in him, either insist the vet run serum calcium and give him injectable (the reason you want to know this is boluses of Ca++ can be quite cardiotoxic so you need to be right, although SQ administration does slow this down a bit) or else ask for a red rubber feeding tube. Again, lube it with edible oil or eggwhite, slide it to the back of the throat and down to the length the vet tells you, and squirt it down gently and then gently flush with an equal volume of water.