Re: [gecko]Re: Question on gecko who fell; and on euthanasia
Aloha, Elizabeth Thank you for your kind words on our little gecko. I do love them all and hate to see any of them die or be hurt. Having them around is hard on me since there tends to be a continual life death drama, particularly with the three species and the hatchlings comings at all times of the year. I try to protect the little ones and the injured as much as I can, but mostly it is palliative. :( I do hope someone can help us on the euthanasia, though. I worry so much that we might be causing them more suffering and I really don't want to do that. Sherron [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Sherron ~ Sorry to hear about this poor soul. You obviously have geckos' best interests at heart. May she rest in peace. I don't have the answer to your euthanasia question, but I'm certain someone on this list might. Elizabeth Subj:*[gecko]Re: Question on gecko who fell; and on euthanasia* Date:6/2/08 4:04:22 PM Pacific Daylight Time From:[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Sherron) Sender:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-to: gecko@lists.gekkota.com mailto:gecko@lists.gekkota.com To:gecko@lists.gekkota.com Ah, our poor little girl started having trouble breathing and her color started turning really bad -- she started getting black blotches on her skin and her eyes started sinking. She would gasp for air every so often, obviously in distress. So it became obvious she did have internal injuries and was not going to make it after all. As long as she seemed to be comfortable, at least when she wasn't moving, we held out hopes of it just being a broken bone or two. Especially since her color was still good this morning and she was breathing okay. But when we have done the only thing we could think of to ease her pain and distress, and that was to put her in the freezer. Since she is a reptile, we are hoping that was a kind thing to do since her body temperature should fall quickly. It is not something we would do with a mammal. Can anyone advise on a better way to put a gecko out of their misery? As long as there is hope and they aren't in obvious distress, we prefer to try to keep them quiet, out of harm's way (from cats, dogs, mongoose or other geckos) and hope for the best. But we do have occasion when they are in obvious pain and it is no favor to them to keep them alive. Once we had a little house gecko that someone had tried to eat and whose skin was partially gone and the ants had gotten to before I found him. He was e but beyond saving, and obviously in pain, and we froze him as we did not know what else to do. If there is something better we could do for them, we would like to know, as unfortunately it is likely to come up again. The day geckos do prey on our other two species, as well as their own youngsters. :( Thanks so much, Sherron Sherron wrote: Aloha, I have another adult gecko with a problem, although I suspect there is nothing we can do for her. We found her yesterday, but hoped she would be better today. We think she must have fallen from the ceiling, as we found her on the tile floor in our kitchen and she was moving weakly. I set her down some papaya and she wiggled behind a box. Later, we found her on the floor near the refrigerator and she was not interested in moving at all. We tried picking her up with a large ti leaf, but she feebly pulled herself up onto my husband's hand and then fell into my hands. We put her in a cage with a leaf to hide under along with fruit and water and hoped that she didn't have any internal injuries. She seemed happier hanging from the side of the cage and looked pretty good this morning. But a little while ago, she fell off the side onto the floor of the cage onto her back and lay there gasping for breath. I'm not sure if they can breathe properly on their backs, so we turned her over -- which stressed her, but she does seem to be able to breathe easier on her stomach. I also misted her as I thought it might help her breathe and she seems a little better now. But is there anything else I can do for her besides just wait and hope she is just having pain from broken ribs and not from internal injuries? Thanks, Sherron *Elizabeth** ~~~geckos make my heart sing (and dance)~~~ * l ll ^^ /..\ ^^ /..\ ^^ ^^ /..\ ^^ l l ^^ \\\ l l /// l l \\\ l l ~~ /// ~~ (~~) ~~ ~~ (~~ ) () () ( ) () lappert(a) robert(a)hubert(a) 17.50 yor.i.p.
Re: [gecko]Question on hatchling Gold Dust Day Gecko having trouble shedding ...
Aloha, Melody Thanks for these ideas. I never thought of a paintbrush, but that would be softer and probably hold the moisture better. ;) Her toes kept sticking to the washcloth, so we did lay a paper towel on top of it and she liked that better. Now that she is back in her regular house, she is on banana leaf with red ti, honeysuckle, and helekonia. We used to have her on paper towels, but she really seems to like the banana leaf and we have tons of them. And the red ti is her favorite for hanging out on. And all the day geckos like the helekonia -- that and the bananas are their favorite hangouts ... along with our lanai and house. ;) Mahalo, Sherron Melody Hartley wrote: Slightly different method -- I use a paper towel rather than a washcloth in the humid box, and float the whole box in a sink full of warm water for the heat. A small soft paintbrush can also be helpful for wetting the old skin and working it loose. [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: And Aloha Sherron ~ Thanks for these details. Please try the humidity chamber near a lamp for a few hours. Use a wet washcloth that has been wrung out and place it in the vented, plastic container. Watch the water droplets form. After only a few hours I imagine her skin might be loose enough to start a split. Another idea! Have something like a twig, small branch, or a section of choya wood --- something rough that she could snuggle up against to assist in the shed. I hope the skin shed helps her right leg work more efficiently! Keep us posted! Wish I lived near the beach in a place warm enough where geckos roamed freely ;-] Elizabeth Aloha, Elizabeth She is about 3/4 from nose to vent -- she is the smallest day gecko hatchling we have ever seen, although some of our mourning gecko hatchlings are even tinier. This sounds like it might work! If it would just soften enough to pull off her or get a split started, I think we could get the neck skin off. We have been misting her little cage and putting a heating pad next to it, but that only helps a little and wasn't keeping the humidity up high enough. She has never seemed to be able to fully control her right leg, and her right foot is smaller than her left and the toes kind of clumped together. She often tends to move the joint and leg together as a unit, so there may be something wrong with the joint, too. Although in watching her with the skin problem, some of that may just be the skin being so tight it restricts her movement. Usually when we find the hatchlings, most of that first skin has already been shed, but she was fully covered with it and it has only recently started splitting. We do think it hinders her use of her limbs -- her arms are only about the size of thin pencil lead, and the skin seems to fully coat those. She has been doing okay up until the last couple of days, though, when the skin (I hope that it isn't something else, too) started really becoming a problem. She now gets around by lurching her body back and forth because her little arms legs are still encased in the skin, although it has come off some of the back. And she is green underneath, not gray! We haven't ever actually kept any of the geckos before, as they run all around our house, lanai and garden (Phelsuma laticauda, house - Hemidactylus frenatus, Mourning - Lepidodactylus lugubris). But we had to make an exception in her case, since she couldn't fend for herself. Usually we just take the hatchlings outside so they have a better chance of survival -- we have lots of big geckos running around inside and they don't last long if we don't get to them first. :( Mahalo, Sherron [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Hello Sherron ~ Try the humidity chamber trick. I can't view your photos at home because my laptop is really memory-challenged, so I don't know how big this gecko is! However, my mourning geckos are 1 3/8 at hatching. Try placing your gecko in a vented plastic container with a damp washcloth inside. Place this near a light. Almost immediately you will notice beads of water accumulate on the sides/top of the container. After a few hours or so perhaps you can remove the rings of old skin around her neck gently with a tweezers or small scissors. What is the problem with her right leg? Might you have a new pet here? Elizabeth Subj:[gecko]Question on hatchling Gold Dust Day Gecko having trouble shedding egg skin Date:6/1/08 4:16:39 PM Pacific Daylight Time From:[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Sherron) Sender:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-to: gecko@lists.gekkota.com mailto:gecko@lists.gekkota.com To:gecko@lists.gekkota.com We found a tiny hatchling on May 13 that was a little underdeveloped and was still in that grayish skin they have when
Re: [gecko]Question on hatchling Gold Dust Day Gecko having trouble shedding ...
Aloha Sharron, You are so patient and dedicated!! This little one is so lucky to have you, since I'm sure she would have been someone's lunch otherwise. If she goes on eating fruit flies, you know you can raise flightess fruit flies, and that might be easier. I do that because I keep a few dart frogs, but I use them for hatchling geckos too. You'd have to get a starter culture from someone, or get one shipped to you if allowed, and keep them strictly separate from the flying ones because flightless is a recessive gene. I can give you more info if you're interested. Do you have the little bugs in the soil called springtails? Or any other tiny bugs you could catch, maybe aphids? I'd hate for you go blind clipping fruit fly wings, LOL! As to the last bits of shedding, she might lose the extra skin on the next shed. I've only gotten the tail skin off by peeling front to back, like turning a cone inside out. The town in Oregon that I live in is named Aloha although pronounced differently -- emphasis on the lo part and a soft h -- ah-LO-ah. It's also nice to see some activity on this list ;-) Melody Gecko wrote: Aloha, Melody Thanks for these ideas. I never thought of a paintbrush, but that would be softer and probably hold the moisture better. ;) Her toes kept sticking to the washcloth, so we did lay a paper towel on top of it and she liked that better. Now that she is back in her regular house, she is on banana leaf with red ti, honeysuckle, and helekonia. We used to have her on paper towels, but she really seems to like the banana leaf and we have tons of them. And the red ti is her favorite for hanging out on. And all the day geckos like the helekonia -- that and the bananas are their favorite hangouts ... along with our lanai and house. ;) Mahalo, Sherron Melody Hartley wrote: Slightly different method -- I use a paper towel rather than a washcloth in the humid box, and float the whole box in a sink full of warm water for the heat. A small soft paintbrush can also be helpful for wetting the old skin and working it loose. [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: And Aloha Sherron ~ Thanks for these details. Please try the humidity chamber near a lamp for a few hours. Use a wet washcloth that has been wrung out and place it in the vented, plastic container. Watch the water droplets form. After only a few hours I imagine her skin might be loose enough to start a split. Another idea! Have something like a twig, small branch, or a section of choya wood --- something rough that she could snuggle up against to assist in the shed. I hope the skin shed helps her right leg work more efficiently! Keep us posted! Wish I lived near the beach in a place warm enough where geckos roamed freely ;-] Elizabeth Aloha, Elizabeth She is about 3/4 from nose to vent -- she is the smallest day gecko hatchling we have ever seen, although some of our mourning gecko hatchlings are even tinier. This sounds like it might work! If it would just soften enough to pull off her or get a split started, I think we could get the neck skin off. We have been misting her little cage and putting a heating pad next to it, but that only helps a little and wasn't keeping the humidity up high enough. She has never seemed to be able to fully control her right leg, and her right foot is smaller than her left and the toes kind of clumped together. She often tends to move the joint and leg together as a unit, so there may be something wrong with the joint, too. Although in watching her with the skin problem, some of that may just be the skin being so tight it restricts her movement. Usually when we find the hatchlings, most of that first skin has already been shed, but she was fully covered with it and it has only recently started splitting. We do think it hinders her use of her limbs -- her arms are only about the size of thin pencil lead, and the skin seems to fully coat those. She has been doing okay up until the last couple of days, though, when the skin (I hope that it isn't something else, too) started really becoming a problem. She now gets around by lurching her body back and forth because her little arms legs are still encased in the skin, although it has come off some of the back. And she is green underneath, not gray! We haven't ever actually kept any of the geckos before, as they run all around our house, lanai and garden (Phelsuma laticauda, house - Hemidactylus frenatus, Mourning - Lepidodactylus lugubris). But we had to make an exception in her case, since she couldn't fend for herself. Usually we just take the hatchlings outside so they have a better chance of survival -- we have lots of big geckos running around inside and they don't last long if we don't get to them first. :( Mahalo, Sherron [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: [gecko]Question on hatchling Gold Dust Day Gecko having trouble shedding ...
Aloha, Sherron ~ I thoroughly enjoyed your e-mails and photos this afternoon!!! I'll check them out thoroughly at work after Field Day (if it doesn't rain) or at the library. (GGA is a great resource!!) You both have come along way with your little Gold Dust gecko. She looks so much better than before. Has she a name? I agree with Melody that she will probably need further human assistance shedding that toe skin and her tail skin. After a short break, I'd advise you to place her in the humidity chamber again perhaps with something rougher than a paper towel to work on her tail and toe. Do you keep anything a bit rough in her regular cage like a twig, a small rough branch, or rock? From your photo those areas seem to have retained more than a single shed and may be difficult for her to remove on her own. Melody suggests peeling the tail skin down from the vent towards the tip if I'm reading her correctly ;-} But I realize the skin needs loosening first. Keep us posted, Elizabeth In a message dated 6/5/08 5:15:29 PM Pacific Daylight Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: As to the last bits of shedding, she might lose the extra skin on the next shed. I've only gotten the tail skin off by peeling front to back, like turning a cone inside out. Elizabeth ~~~geckos make my heart sing (and dance)~~~ l ll ^^ /..\ ^^ /..\ ^^ ^^ /..\ ^^ l l ^^ \\\ l l /// l l \\\ l l ~~ /// ~~ (~~) ~~ ~~ (~~ ) () () ( ) () lappert(a) robert(a)hubert(a) 17.50 yor.i.p.r.i.p. (All Lepidodactylus lugubris!) BRBR**BRGet trade secrets for amazing burgers. Watch Cooking with Tyler Florence on AOL Food.BR (http://food.aol.com/tyler-florence?video=4?amp; NCID=aolfod000302)/HTML
