Got the forum to work for me long enough to post a thread! Many friends appreciated this information on another forum so I'm hoping people here find it helpful as well.
I'd been keeping an eye on one of my female Tokay's (Overcast) behavior for the past week because I was expecting another clutch of eggs if she and Black Frost had bred again. I would catch her in her normal activities of peeking around logs and darting away when she noticed me watching and I had just cleaned their tank about a month ago (these guys are great in the fact that full tank cleaning isn't necessary as often due to them selecting a certain corner for their restroom).
Maybe 2 days max passed that I didn't see her (very common with my WC Tokays), and I suppose I should actually thank my family dysfunctions for keeping me home over the weekend because Sunday morning I saw Overcast at the top of their tank looking like she wasn't putting much effort into holding on. I try get my Tokays unflighty at my mere presence by not moving directly at them when I see them out and about so I didn't immediately walk up to her, but seeing as I was cleaning my room I did eventually in front of the tank.
She looked rather dehydrated and didn't rush off so I opened the exo-terra and picked her up; no complaints, no running, just picked her right up. My initial thought from how limp and weak she felt was a calcium crash, but after searching the tank I still found the most recent eggs to be from 8-30. I noticed she was in shed and the skin was hanging loose everywhere, catching on her claws and tearing, so I broke it away and peeled each foot leaving her head for last since she seemed agitated by only that.
The only mark on her body was one typical, 3/4-1/2 mouth breeder nip on the left side of her neck. I thought nothing of it since all my geckos are naturally neck biters during courtship and initial breeding. The skin from the back of her head to her nose (only on the top) was more difficult to remove and if it wasn't for the fact that it had already come loose from the rest of her body I would have thought I had shed her prematurely.
Below are the photos of her head as soon as the skin came off, plus the shed skin folded back on to show no scars or marks other than the small spot on the left side of her neck.
Areas of her face started 'weeping' fluid and blood without lacerations and over a matter of hours the entire back and sides of her head were purple bruised. You can see the back of her head is swelled as well as her left eye, both areas close to the breeder nip that is now difficult to see through everything. I have included normal photos in between since she had an unusually colored head that made all this look much worse.
I showed her to 2 friends since it was Sunday and not only could I not afford an emergency vet, I don't know one that does Herps, but there wasn't really anything we wanted to try before getting internal antibiotics. I called my vet as soon as they opened Monday morning for an appointment that day. I took Black Frost with me in case Dr. White wanted to check anything on him since it was his bite that caused it.
Overcast weighed 74g so she was only about 5g less than she had been a month prior. Dr. White looked her over, compared her to healthy photos I'd brought, looked at her shed, took a skin scrape of her head, fecal from both (neither had any parasites!
) and gave Overcast a shot of Baytril. He found bacteria in the skin scrape, no fungus, explained how common and easily that occurs, how quickly it spreads (explaining the dramatic drop in her condition between when I'd last seen her and this happening) and sent me home with oral Baytril doses, Silvadine cream (Silver Sulfadiazine) for her head, and Carnivore Care dietary supplement in case she wouldn't eat. I took 2 shots of her as we left with my phone.
The only change I noticed between when I left and 3pm when I finally had to get to sleep for work that night was that she now just wanted to lay in the kritter keeper instead of consistently climbing the sides as she had for the past 24 hours. At 8pm when I got up for work she was already gone. All I could do was put her in the fridge and take her back the morning. Dr. White took a sample of her liver and a 'punch' of her head to examine and called me about 6:40 Tuesday night to let me know what he found and my other options.
Overcast's head and liver each had high concentrations of bacteria confirming septicemia, the latter even having white 'dots' being so much, but he didn't have what was needed to confirm the types or that they even matched from both locations. He also found she had the first stages of pneumonia as a result which turns the lungs dark red from congestion, so much so that he actually did not recognize her lungs until he cut them open. He said pneumonia is a very fast killer of Herps and there is hardly anything you can look for and notice to actually be able to catch it.
Aside from loosing Overcast, Dr. White told me she had had 3 uncalcified eggs developing that weren't at any stage to even consider removing to save. He also said said it's possible that being gravid could have helped the infection spread faster since her body was focused on developing offspring.
He sent the liver sample to be cultured to try and identify the bacteria in case we need to take a mouth swab on Frost or someone else turns up with similar symptoms we will have a better idea of what to start treating. If he thinks it's necessary from something coming up in the culture, I can look into later sending other samples for tissue analysis.
Be mindful of any wound, whether to yourself or your animal. This hit Overcast faster than I could have helped her, but you never know. Though this doesn't mean you need to check your animals so frequently as to wind up causing them unnecessary stress. Being familiar with your animal's typical behaviors and personality are key to catching problems in Herps because by the time they have visible symptoms it is most often too late.
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Always be mindful of bites on your animals (slight graphic image warning)
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