Leopard Gecko Struggling to take food

mewpixel

New Member
Messages
3
About your leo:
- Female
- 6 years old & Currently weighs 40g (she is underweight but stops eating in the summer)
- I have owned her 4 years
- She was given to me by someone who said their child wasn't looking after her; but I believe she was from a pet store.

A) Health/History
- She is handled a couple times a week
- Her behaviour is completely normal in terms of leopard geckos, she is eating, drinking and behaving the same as she always has.
- When I first got her she was severely underweight, but no other physical health problems.
B) Fecals
- Poop seems completely normal size and shape.
- I am unsure but I think she last pooped a few days ago
C) Problem
- She developed what I can only describe as a sudden neurological problem, she can no longer take food correctly, she snaps her mouth open and closed at the food a lot, and I have been hand feeding her since, sometimes I have to physically put the food into her mouth, which she then chews like normal and eats. She is just as enthusiastic as she ever was about food, but backs up a lot when she is trying to take it.

Housing:
A) Enclosure
- It is 3ft.
- Wooden vivarium
- She is currently on coco fibre but will be moving to slate soon.
-She has three hides, all ceramic. One is enclosed, with moss inside which acts as her humid hide. She also has a bottomless hide above her heat mat.
B) Heating
- She has a heat mat.
- 28C on her hot side, 25C on the cool side.
- Heat mat is connected to a thermostat.
- Two digital thermometers.
- She has a UVB bulb on one side of her cage, above her heat mat.
C) Cage mates
- No cage mates

Describe Diet:
A) Typical diet
- She has crickets every three days and occasionally has locusts, though she is very picky. She also has a mealworm dish in her cage, though she doesn't touch them very often.
- I have been hand feeding her since the problem started, and her mealworms are in a dish.
B) Supplements (describe how often)
- Pro rep calcium two feeds in a row, then nutrobal the next.
- Carrot and cucumber, dusted with arcadia insectfuel.

Hi! I hope everything in her Set up is okay. Her name is Nova, I believe she is a wild morph. This probably started a couple months ago, where she snaps her mouth open and closed when trying to take food. Before then, she had never had a problem before. I own two other leopard geckos who are both behaving completely normal, and also do not struggle to maintain weight. Other than this, she has no other health problems at all, so it seems so strange for it to suddenly develop. I took a video of her trying to take a cricket from me, which I hope I can add correctly!

 

The lizards

Member
Messages
88
I may not be of much help, but you can try to gently push the cricket against her nose and she may open her mouth and eat it. One of my leos does the exact same thing, though he's just lazy. He expects the cricket to go automatically in his mouth (he came from a breeding situation), so I do this and it works for him. Hope this is of any help!
 

acpart

Geck-cessories
Staff member
Messages
15,170
Location
Somerville, MA
I have a number of leopard geckos. Some of them at some point don't hunt well on their own and I end up hand feeding them, even though they spent years hunting fine. I don't know why it happens and in the long run it's been easier for me to feed them this way than to solve the problem, if there really is one.

Aliza
 

mewpixel

New Member
Messages
3
I have a number of leopard geckos. Some of them at some point don't hunt well on their own and I end up hand feeding them, even though they spent years hunting fine. I don't know why it happens and in the long run it's been easier for me to feed them this way than to solve the problem, if there really is one.

Aliza
Thank you so much for your reply! I don't mind hand feeding her, I was more worried that it was a symptom of an underlying problem :)) she's still healthy, so I guess she's just got a little quirk now !
 

panthergecko

Member
Messages
312
Location
Brooklyn
I would like to but shes SO picky. My males will eat literally anything but I can just about get her to take crickets. She won't take locust, mealworms or silkworms. She only likes crickets and waxworms ofc!
Horn worms are a good way to get them interested, also dubia is another option
 

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