Never poops... only urates

[micharoo47]

My girl has been passing only urates for the past three months, never actual poop. She always has a healthy appetite when I feed her, and she does not seem constipated. There are no hard lumps near her cloaca, and she isn't all fat and bunchy near the tail. However, when I stretch her tail out and hold it straight, I can see 2 small bumps on her side, barely protruding... if you look closely at the pics where she's all straightened out you can see them (sorry for the bad quality pics). They are soft and yielding to the touch and feel like loose skin. Also, sometimes when she is around my wrist she will constrict tightly all around and work sections of her body in a pattern of constricting and releasing; is this her trying to poop? She is about a year old, is this normal for babies to go a while without pooping? She has grown about a foot in the past 3 months and her girth has grown proportionately. I feed her one medium f/t fuzzy a week, humidity around 50% with occasional jumps to 80% when I spray the tank, hot side is 85 and cool side is 65. Thanks for your advice... I hope nothing is wrong with her.

[Anya]

Hello. I hope someone can answer your question, but I wanted to let you know that your temps are pretty low. You want you warm side to be closer to 89-92 and your cool side to be closer to 75-80. And make sure your measuring temps with an IR gun, or a digital thermometer, as the little dial analog ones are rubbish.

I can't see any pictures, I'm afraid.

[micharoo47]

here are the pics:

http://imgur.com/J4CQ9Nt
http://imgur.com/b9yjJoB
http://imgur.com/o2Iu3uq
http://imgur.com/omwfqq6

[bcr229]

She is about a year old... I feed her one medium f/t fuzzy a week... hot side is 85 and cool side is 65.

As was stated before, temperature range should be around 90 on the hot side, 80 on the cool side. Too low and your BP can't digest her food.

Next, her food - mice or rat fuzzies? Because mice fuzzies will be little more than an appetizer for her at this age, from what I can see in the pictures she should be on weanling if not small rats by now. How much does she weigh?

[micharoo47]

Thanks, I will raise the temps. As for her weight, I don't remember the exact numbers but I weighed her and I weighed the Medium Arctic Mice I feed her and one of them is 1/10th of her weight and as big around as her largest part.

Update: After I took the pictures last night, I handled her for a while and noticed two hard lumps in her belly about six inches in from the end of her tail. I hadn't felt them before because I was being too gentle to feel the lumps. She stopped moving her front end once I started massaging her stomach all the way down and started pulsing the stomach muscles near the lumps like she was trying to digest/move them. I'm going to try a 45-min soak in warm water combined with a massage to try to help her digest. Does anyone know of any other tricks?

[Neal]

I'd say lowest for the warm side 88, preferably close to 90. I would try to raise the cool side as well a bit, to I'd say the low 80's.

Soaking in warm water may help you but if you don't see her pass it in a day or two I'd see about visiting a vet.

[alykoz]

Hot spots help them digest. She may not have been getting enough heat. They love to chill on places that are atleast 90 degrees

[Stewart_Reptiles]

When you say

She always has a healthy appetite

can you elaborate because this

I feed her one medium f/t fuzzy a week

would suggest you are not feeding your BP enough, if your BP does not eat or barely eats it will use the little food it gets for it's growth leaving nothing to be eliminated.

No food or not enough = no poop