What amount of weight loss is normal?

Silverfire

New member
I recently bought a digital scale and have been weighing my geckos and I noticed that my adult male had lost a gram in a week. Is this a sign of something bad or just normal weight fluctuation? He hasn’t been eating all that much lately, though I’m not super concerned about a decreased appetite since it is breeding and there hasn’t been any signs of something sinister (poops regular and his poop looks completely normal). He’s been his normal curious self, always coming to the glass to say hi and beg for waxworms.

He’s shedding normally too, in fact he shed two weeks ago. It was a nice and clean shed, nothing stuck and he ate it all (at least I’m assuming he ate it all. Either that or he got the classic super pale shed coloration for a single day). He’s on reptile carpet, the only loose substrate would be the eco earth in his humid hut. Floor temps are 88-90 on the warm side (86 in his humid hut which he enjoys laying in quite a bit) and 73-75 on the cool side. He’s on the schedule that Elizabeth suggests for supplements and he’s offered one to two waxworms a week. His main diet is crickets gutloaded with Repashy’s feeder feed and fulker’s cricket quencher. He also eats superworms. He’s colors have actually gotten more vivid recently too.

I don’t know if I’m just being paranoid or what, but they weigh so little I feel like loosing a single gram could mean a lot.
 

acpart

Well-known member
How much does he weigh? If we're talking about 6 vs. 7 grams, that's a big difference, but if it's 62 vs. 63 grams I don't think it's a big deal. I had a male gecko for 12 years that wouldn't eat for most of the winter and often lost as much as 20 grams. However, when he was at his top weight during the summer it was 85 grams, so I didn't worry too much.

Aliza
 

acpart

Well-known member
I feel that worrying less is a good personal growth experience, unless a person tends not to worry much at all, in which case you can say the same thing about worrying a bit more!

Aliza
 

Geecko123

New member
He was 78 last week and 77 this week. So he’s not skinny. I’m just a worrywart about my babies.

I am a little bit of a worry wart to when I saw a small armpit bubble I almost had a panic attack because I had never heard of this before, I thought he had some type of disease, or that I had done something wrong.:lol:
 

HamiltonJoanne

New member
To weigh geckos, you don't need any unique scales. The simplest and more than accurate device is an ordinary kitchen scale. To entertain your pet, put it on the scale, wait until it calms down, stop fidgeting, and then determine the weight. To determine the weight faster, you can also use a bowl that will completely fit your pet, but do not forget to subtract the importance of this bowl from the overall result later. Keeping a weighing diary is very important. I chose for myself https://www.vont.com/product/digital-kitchen-scale/ and when I wanted to attach a link to you, I came across https://www.amazon.com/Vont-Beautiful-Measurement-Stainless-Batteries/dp/B08SW6F5SZ and I am sure that you will like these scales.
 
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