Lately I had a problem rear its ugly head with my scaley tails. Worms.
I used to be able to get dewormer for them but these days you have to go to a vet to get your reptiles dewormed.

That was what the vets wanted me to think. I had done homework on the subject and came up with a drug called Panacur for reptiles but the wait to get it from the UK was ridiculous and my lizards were sick NOW. The active ingredient is fenbendazole. After doing more homework I found other products that you can get with fenbendazole in. The drug comes in three forms: intravenous liquid, paste, and oral liquid.
I went to a place locally called Lomita Feed in Lomita California and for $13 plus tax I bought a 25 gram tube of Safeguard for horses. It is a syringe like tube filled with white paste. It has a sweet smell and application for the lizard is very easy. It does not take much depending on the lizard. In the case of my bearded dragon I put a dot about the size of the applicator tip on the lizards lips (PLURAL). The idea is when the lizard opens its mouth to sniff (because they actually "Lick" air to smell) it gets the medication on its tongue and will lick itself clean. Since the paste is sweet the lizard is unlikely to reject the medication. For a large Iguana five foot plus in length overall) I would run a QUARTER OF AN INCH of the paste and no more on its lips! A little of this stuff goes a LONG Way for lizards. With small lizards like Anoles and Swifts use a tooth pick and put a dot on the lizards lips.
13 dollars goes a LOOOOOOOONG way!

ALWAYS apply the medication to the tip of the lizards snout on the lips. DO not try to put the applicator in the lizards mouth as this will risk an overdose making the lizard vomit violently! An underdose is not like antibiotics where the parasite can aquire an immunity to it. This stuff is very powerful. In most cases you need to treat for three straight days with a followup two weeks later and one at six months to assure complete destruction of internal parasites. If you are lucky enough to own an alligator, if the animal is six to eight feed I would put a two inch line on or in its food. From there you have to calculate body weight because the dosage is the same pound for pound animal for animal. One 25 gram tube treats 1100 pounds of horse once. Yes you do need to use math here!

Now lets do the economics math:

$13 plus sales tax for the 25 gram tube = hundreds of treatments for my lizards.

VS.

$50 for each visit and the cost of the medication I have to buy from them which can be $20 or more on top of that.

Granted vets can at least look at what is causing the lizard to be sick since many different types of Parasite are out there but fenbendazole is not too shabby against protazoa either. With real bad infestations you will need to use Bird Antibiotics because parasites can cause secondary infections. Sulfa based antibiotics are the best since they are broad spectrum. Avian Antibiotics are generally introduced to the bird via its drinking water. Getting the lizard to lick the dewormer and using an eye dropper to drip water with Antibiotic and Appetite stimulants on its snout while it licks will get it badly needed water and vitamins to help a speedy recovery. If the lizard keeps lapping at the water give it all it can drink!
A personal favorite to use appetite stimulant is "Bone Aid Liquid Calcium" made by TREX products. It has additives to make it more appealing to the lizard as well as provide Calcium which is critical to good reptile health. This combination has saved lizards for me before but I was using Tetra brand dewormer when it was available and it had the same ingredients and smelled the same as the stuff I am using now.

My bearded dragon was SICK and was crapping weird partially digested wads of Meal worms and started to get crinkleing in the tail. All of her legs began to look withered as well. This condition is usually fatal. Three days into treatment she is back to her usual energetic self again! She is eating and starting to look like she is filling in again as well as eating with her usual gusto.
I am supplementing with vitamin powder dusted on her food right now as well. Usually if you have a sick lizard you have to treat for parasites, bacterial infection, and digestive shut down all at once. This eventually leads to kidney failure which is fatal UNLESS you can get the kidneys to start again but it is rare because usually once kidney failure sets in it is over.

The way to attempt to reverse this is using PH neutral water with a sugar and a tiny amount of salt added to it.
You need to force the lizard to drink at this point. Gatoraid diluted to one third its strength works good for this actually. IT MUST BE ROOM TEMPERATURE! If you thermally shock your lizard you WILL kill it. Use a plastic tipped Syringe appropriately sized to the lizard so you can get the tip of the syringe past the bronchial opening in the lizard's throat at the back of its tongue. You only need to use tiny doses two to three times day and insure the lizard has access to sunlight preferably but it must be kept warm to reactivate its digestive tract! Make sure it has a hiding place available to it so it does not over heat. If the Lizard is on deaths door use a temperature controlled incubator instead. It is important to make sure the reptile remains hydrated and also has some nutrients available to it. That is why Gatoraid works well for this. The salts also stimulate the kidneys to work if they have not begun to atrophy.

To get a syringe into a lizards mouth my favorite method is to put the tip near the back of the lip line ahead of the jaw muscles and gently roll back in forth in small motions with the length of the syringe tip pressed gently on the lizard's lips. When the lizard opens its mouth I move the tip into position and let about a cc or two for smaller lizards, 5 to 10 cc for lizards like my bearded dragon, 20 to 50 ccs for larger lizards, of fluid into the lizards mouth. If the Lizard is really sick I actually force the tube part way down its throat and force feed it fluid.

Never use metal or glass for this! NEVER NEVER NEVER! Plastic ONLY in case the lizard bites down on it.
You will know if you are seeing a reversal of its condition in a couple of days. I have saved dying lizards like this before and I am not a vet!

in all of that... where the hell is your question?

This is not a question. I am sharing information for those of us who have pet reptiles.




Am I doing something wrong here?


Part of these posts is to share more than just "I'm SO Lonely" or "WHY CAN"T I GET A DATE" or "Why is no one contacting me" and all the other varieties of romance related subject matter.

Did something change I am not aware of???

No, you are not doing anything wrong. Usually questions are asked and that is why one was expected.

Thank you for clearing that up.

Try to locate Henry Schiff in Los Angeles. He an old riding buddy of mine, and is an expert on those little creatures. He's even changed his middle name to Lizardlover. Henry Lizardlover Schiff. He's got those things runnin all over his house. lol Dennis