Help. I have a rescue.

I have always wanted a bearded dragon but now I have one that needs total care. The front legs are deformed, but still can get around just fine. My father had polio and I am used to admoralities. In fact, I perfer to take care of these animals. I have a motherly nature about me because of my past. She has been here less than 3 hours and I have had her fall asleep on my chest. She is real gentle and not scared of me. I have crickets in with her and water with special light. I have a room set up especialy for reptiles. Any more advice?

Give proper heating, uv and food. In time will get better and stronger.

Pinky mice can be given sparingly to fatten her up if shes under weight. But not as a sole diet.

My next question, Are frozen thawed veggies ok, or should I stick with fresh only?

We do fresh only because veggies can lose some nutritional value when frozen and then thawed. Our beardie loves fresh mustard greens and they're $2-$3 a bunch at Whole Foods and they're high in calcium which sounds like what your beardie was lacking that caused his/her front legs to become deformed. Sounds like Metabolic Bone Disease, which is a lack of calcium and/or enough UV light. This is a great chart to go off of for feeding. The beardie needs a hot spot of at least 100* so they can digest their food properly, and a slightly cooler side. It's recommended to replace the UV bulb every 5 or 6 months because they can stop emitting UV rays around that time, but they'll still give off light so it's hard to tell.

Best of luck with your beardie and congrats on the rescue!

I hope this is right, in the last 2 days she has eaten 36 crickets, fresh collard greens, a few carrot shavings, and 2 new born pinkies. She seems to be perking back up since we got her temps back up to where they should be and given her some food, and a good soaking. She really seemed to enjoy the bath. From what I have been told she was abandoned for around 7 weeks after the previous owner was evicted. We also have a ball python from the same situation.

im glad she liked the bath. thats the best way to keep them hydrated regualr soaks and fresh veggies. also this is a controvertial topic but Pinkies will aid in her weight gain tremendously and if you have the proper temps and proper hydration there will be no problems of impaction. like i said earlier beardies are so sweet and Im glad that a neglected one found u a thoughful owner

what is this special light did you end up getting a mvb or just using the orchid one? did u happen to do any research regarding the spectrum dont want to put u on blast but im very curious to see if it is the same sounds very very similar

Sounds like she's getting better! I'd hold off on more pinkies though just because they're so fatty. Collard greens are really good because they have a good amount of calcium. Do you have a calcium and multivitamin dust? You should dust the crickets with the calcium powder and a multivitamin powder. We usually put the calcium on crickets and the multivitamin on the greens/veggies.

Did you just get her from this situation? If so, she's going to need high amounts of calcium and vitamin D so definitely get a calcium with vit D powder soon if you haven't already and get a good UV bulb soon if you haven't already. Sounds like she has MBD possibly currently. Have you taken her to a vet? They might recommend a different/prescription calcium supplement to help get her bones back in order. My friend's beardie got MBD when her UV light stopped emitting UV but still gave off light, and now one of his front legs is permanently deformed, but still usable, but he's doing very good. Her vet recommended Bearded Dragon Bites with a special calcium supplement on them since the bites are soft and easily chewable with a soft jaw [the jaw can get soft when a beardie has MBD since all their bones are turning to mush basically] and they taste like prickly pear so it's highly appealing.

My beardie loves her baths! Always gets her happy and perked up!

Thank you for rescuing the poor girl and if you have anymore questions I'd be happy to answer if I can and if I can't, I'm sure someone else can!

pinkies are used to fatten up beardies EXACTLY have u seen this beardie LOL it could use as many pinkies as itll eat. pinkies are often used to plump up female breeders befor season. this is why I would highly recomend them as well as roaches but if u do not have access to roaches as we have already discussed ordering them is an option or baby mice. pinkies good source of nutrition all the way around I have had beardies for years and some people trip about pinkies but in my opinnion and experiences they are 100% fine especially with all the horrors some animals face a pinkie wont hurt anything. and ya I would definitely buy a mvb especially if she looks to have mbd. and take her to the vet especailly if u are getting attached it can go down hill suprisingly fast.

I was only saying hold off on pinkies because I heard they were super fatty and only good as a treat type of thing, but you sound like you have a bit more experience than me so ok.

Like LostCoast said, a mercury vapor bulb is going to be a good idea because it does heat and UV. Just make sure you get a taller sun dome so the bulb doesn't touch the screen top. Ceramic heat emitters are nice too because then you can leave them on at night as well for night time heat too. We got an infrared bulb recently for night heat since we just moved and it was getting too cold in her tank at night, and our beardie loves it. Huge ditto to LostCoast also on the MBD going downhill fast, when my friend's beardie got it, they were unsure how long the bulb hadn't been working, but said that it can very bad very fast, and that she caught it just in time and any longer and it would've been hard to save her beardie. But, he's made a full recovery since and just has the one leg deformity I mentioned before.

She has a strong jaw, I think the deformities happened at a younger age. Looks like both front ankles were broken and healed at funny angles. I won't feed her anymore pinkies for a little while. But she is eating like a pig. The full orchid light puts out both UVA and UVB, just not in a strong enough dose. I am looking for a UVB 10.0 bulb now. Can't get roaches in Florida, against the law to import them. However, we can get Butter Worms which I have been told are very high in fat as well. They cost 25 cents each, so that might get expensive after a while, can't afford 15 of those a day. So they will problably get used as food once a week with crickets on the other days. What is a good feeding cycle for her, crickets and veggies every day or should I alternate them? Anyway here's a couple of pics of her. Right now she looks Purple because they last owner or should I say non-owner had her on purple vita-sand.

http://i1228.photobucket.com/albums/...1/100_1753.jpg

http://i1228.photobucket.com/albums/...1/100_1754.jpg

Does she look saveable?

The water dish has been removed since these pics were taken.

Also, When we soaked her, we only left her in the water for about 5 minutes. How long should we let her soak? When I said abandoned, I meant it, the electricity was off in the house for 7 weeks. No fresh water, no food, no heat or lights. I am so surprised that she made it this far. God bless her little soul.

7 weeks with no UV or heat?! She is a lucky girl! She looks a bit under weight, but she looks good for being abandoned for so long! And yes, she looks savable! Is she lethargic at all?

Offer greens daily and crickets every other day once she gets back to normal, but for now, I'd do crickets in the morning and greens at night, so she's getting enough protein. We usually do greens in the morning and night one day and then crickets for one meal and greens for another meal the next day. She'll still need the calcium dust and multivitamin dust. The containers we have of it, we use daily and it's lasted us a while!

Exo-Terra Desert 10.0 UV bulb is what we use. It's $20 at Petsmart last time I was in there.

As for her legs, that's what my friend's beardie looked like when his leg deformed, except his curls in rather than out like it looks like hers do. If she can walk on them, she should be fine. She might not be as active because of it, but really, most beardies are lazy anyway lol

We let our beardie stay in the bath for as long as she wants. I've never had her want to be in there for longer than about 10 minutes though. If you're in a rush though, I'd say just make sure your beardie gets a few good drinks of water. Also, be careful of her pooing in the water... I nearly picked up Isis when just before she started to poo in the bath one time. lol

Thankyou so much for all of the help. She is active, constantly looking around, seems to be very alert since we have good heat for her now. I'm using a repti-sun lamp during the day and a red lamp at night. Both are 100 watt. Are alfalfa sprouts ok for her to eat. I have kept iguanas before so I'm not really new to vegetarian lizards. I named her Christmas since my husband claims that she is my Christmas gift. How many crickets should she be eating per day? I just picked up some calcium powder today, still need to get the vitamin powder. How much calcium should I be putting on her food? Last night she slept on her rock hide under the heat lamp. Tonight she is sleeping in her hide. I think this might be a good sign that her enclosure temps are good for her. My husband has all the thermometers in use for his snakes right now so don't know what the exact temp is. Should be able to pick another one up within the next week or so.

If she's active and alert, that's a good sign. http://beautifuldragons.503xtreme.com/Nutrition.html This is an amazing reference for what to feed bearded dragons. Anything in green is really good and should be daily, black is ok but not as good as green and those are the two I stick to, though there is a chart to say what the other colors mean. I think alfalfa sprouts are black so they're good.

For the powders, we have a dedicated gallon baggie that we keep with the powder and we put the crickets/veggies in there and then just put about a half a spoonful in the baggie, get a little air in there and shake it up and then whatever coats the veggies/crickets should be good. The general rule is to give them as many crickets as they can eat in 15 minutes. We buy freeze dried crickets and fill the metal bowl about half full and what she doesn't eat at night she'll eat in the morning usually, but our beardie won't chase live crickets so we had to go with the freeze dried.

She is so funny, she chases the crickets when she hears them scratching against the newspaper substrate or seems them walking around. She just perks right up, she will get right up over the top of them with her head pointed down and stares at them daring them to move. I'll try to get some footage of her in action. She really is comical about it. She really gobbled up the pinkies yesterday. She ate like 20 crickets in about 5 minutes. Looked a lot like a horned toad sitting on an ant mound, zip, zip, zip, and all the crickets were gone.