Leopard gecko not eating and acting strange

Question

I have a leopard gecko who's a little over a year old.

I've had her for about a month now. I have reptile carpet, a warm hideout, a cool hideout and a humid hideout. Also a little bowl of calcium, food bowl, and water bowl. I have a ceramic heater the warm side stays around 90 °F and the cool side around 78 °F.

She was very curious and friendly at first, but now she spends most of her time in the humid hideout.

She was eating fine and then I noticed some weird poop. Then I also noticed that she was getting ready to shed. As she got closer to shedding she stopped eating and kept to herself. She shed fine and nothing was stuck to her, but she wasn't really eating - and this was about 2-3 weeks ago.

I took her to the vet and they said she looked and felt healthy, but gave me a mixture of medicines to perk up her appetite and to move anything through that might be taking longer. She will eat a couple crickets, but her poop still doesn't look normal - it's kind of mushy and the stool doesn't really seem to be separated from the urine.

She just sits in the humid or warm hideout most of the time, even when I put food in front of her, and her tail isn't fattening up.

But when she does move around she definitely seems to have energy and isn't lethargic. I also took in a stool sample and I was told there were no parasites.

I also dust the food with vitamin D₃ powder and recently got vitamin powder too!

I'm just concerned about her because her stool still doesn't look normal and her tail, while not skinny, is not fat and is not getting bigger. I'm just wondering if anyone has any advice.

Thank you in advance!

Answer 1

I would add variety to what insects she eats, this will entice her to eat. Some good options:

• Small Hornworms
• Waxworms (high in fat)
• Butterworms
• Silkworms

These are all soft worms that are very nutritious and will definitely get your gecko interested.

Monitor her weight to check for weight loss, reptiles metabolize their food/nutrients much differently from us so unless she's losing weight I wouldn't be concerned about her not wanting to eat as much. As adults they also tend to not eat as much as when they were babies since they are no longer growing.

Geckos can lay infertile eggs, they do not need a mate. If they have some eggs in the making this can also affect stool and appetite.

Leopard geckos by nature are nocturnal which is why she may be hiding most of the day in her house. Try changing the feeding schedule to accommodate her internal clock, she should be most active at night when you are sleeping.

Your setup sounds proper, if she loses weight after trying the above I would seek a second opinion or re-submit a fecal sample that should be sent to a lab. Reptile parasites are different from our cats and dogs so if the hospital staff is not familiar with looking for them it is highly probable that it was missed.