Eye closed after shedding

microracer24

microracer24

Member
Chameleon Info:
  • Your Chameleon - 11 month old Panther. I have had him for 3 weeks.
  • Handling - Only a few times.
  • Feeding - Horn worms, Silk worms, Super Worms, Dubias, Orange Heads, Crickets. Every other day I feed him a mixture of how much he will eat before I go to work in the morning. I have a gutload I made from apples, oranges, squash, strawberries, kale, carrots, oats, and blueberries. Put everything in a blender then into ice cube trays. I also just bought cricket crack, roach chow, and wow chow.
  • Supplements - Rep-Cal no D3 every day. Rep-Cal w/ D3 and Herptivite every other week.(Only once so far)
  • Watering - Mistking. 10 minutes in the morning around 8. Every 4 hours during the day for 5 minutes.
  • Then again for 10-15 minutes around 6PM.
  • Fecal Description - I think it looks pretty normal. Well formed. Urates have been super white until about 4 or 5 days ago they are slightly orange. This happened around the same time he started shedding.
  • History - Seems very healthy, great appetite, and loves to hunt and move about his cage during the day.

Cage Info:
  • Cage Type - Dragonstrand 2x2x4 with plastic front, side, rear, and screen top and left side panel.
  • Lighting - Zoomed T5 HO UVB and a basking light. I also have a blue led that I use before he goes to bed to help him transition so it isn't so abrupt...light on to light off. Decided to do that after listening to the one podcast Bill from Dragonstrand does.
  • Temperature - I measure his skin in the basking area with an IR gun around 89F. The digital thermometer I have midway down the cage reads around 75F to 77F during the day. My house never gets below 65 at night.
  • Humidity - Between 50% and 90% depending on how long it has been since the mister has gone off.
  • Plants - Live plant. Pothos, umbrella, and a tree that came with him...not sure what it is but it has been in their since day one as I understand. I just ordered the ledges so I can put up some more lateral walkways. There are a couple vines that run up and down that he likes to climb and a wooden ladder that hangs from the top that is used for his basking perch.
  • Placement - Near a window right when you walk into my house.
  • Location - Northern New Jersey.

Current Problem - So he started to shed about 5 days ago. Started at the head and ended at the tip of his tail...which I had to help with the last inch or so. No big deal it went very well and took roughly 2+ days. Well like I said earlier I noticed the urates had a orange color to them so I misted extra the last few days. He also never stopped eating so that's good. However yesterday I come home from work during the day and his left eye is closed and sunken in. I freaking out because my last little guy I got from PetSmart died on me after 3 weeks and was closing his eyes during the day didn't eat etc etc...but that is a different story he was sick from day one I just didn't know enough to realize it. Back on track. So here we are a day later and he still doesn't want to open that eye. He does when he is eating or when I try to get his attention but otherwise it's closed and VERY sunken in. (see pic below) Last night I tried flushing it with gentle pure saline and put a few turtle eye drops in. I say tried because my wife is out of town and he didn't want any part of it so trying to hold him and clean his eye was nearly impossible. I called the vet today and the soonest I can get him in is Monday but I don't think I can wait that long. I also posted a question about excess mucus and what it looks like but got no reply. I noticed last night when he was agitated and opening his mouth that the sticky stuff in his mouth(not sure how else to describe it) stuck to his upper and lower jaw kinda like if you put something sticky between your fingers then open them up. I don't hear wheezing or popping and I don't see any mucus outside his mouth. If I missed something please ask and I'll try to answer it. If you look at my avatar you will see his big beautiful eyes and what they normally look like. Thanks!
20160916_182304.jpg
 
I am having problems right now just like you are. I have a tentative red. Every time he has a hard shed that happens. Just keep Flushing if it gets worse bringing it to the vet is always a possibility.
 
microracer24 That's a lot of misting for a panther in a solid walled cage, which is very good for an animal that is compromised such as your guy right now. I've never worked with Panthers, but even my quads don't get that much total minutes of misting and I keep them pretty wet. You might want to cut down your misting to two long sessions a day with multiple short sessions in between to keep the humidity up once you get his eye issue cleared up.

Can you post a picture of his urates? Sometimes when they don't defecate for a long time, the urates will have a yellow or orange color at one end. Is that what you are seeing?

Animals will close their eye and pull it back into the socket to protect it if it has some kind of an irritation either from an injury, debris or infection. Think about how you react to a minor scratch to your eye. You might be seeing that.

You'll find a lot of talk on here about Vitamin A deficiency, which can show up as eye problems as well as respiratory and mouth issues. Vitamin A is involved with the function of skin. A deficiency will cause thickening of the skin. The skin and linings of all kinds of places like the gut and various ducts won't function properly so things get blocked. Opportunist infections can take hold. While Vitamin A deficiency is a real problem with chameleons, I don't think Vitamin A deficiency is the reason your chameleon's eye is shut (although he also might be deficient of Vitamin A).

You earlier asked about what excess mucus from a respiratory infection looks like. I have never had an animal with a respiratory infection diagnosed by a vet so can't help you there, but I can tell reassure you that you will sometimes see those strings of saliva you describe. If you are worried about a respiratory infection watch his breathing when he is relaxed. In general, you shouldn't even see them take in a breath. It is not a good sign if you see them inhale deeply, which is not to be confused with when they inflate their lungs and puff up in a defense response. An animal with a compromised respiratory system will take deep, noticeable breaths. Chameleons don't seem to breath very often, so frequency is not something I notice even with an animal that has a compromised respiratory system (which I have had some experience with).

From your picture and your description, he seems hydrated and basically doing well except he has something wrong with his eye. He can likely wait for your vet appointment Monday. I hope you made the appointment with a vet who has some experience and interest in reptiles. I would not put anything in his eye except sterile artificial tears to try to keep the eye lubricated. I would just drip sterile artificial tears onto the eye many times a day. I think it a mistake to put anything into or on an animal's eye that isn't prescribed by a vet or sterile artificial tears or perhaps sterile saline solution designed for people. You will not be able to flush his eye yourself. When I had a similar issue my vet used a tool specifically for flushing the eye and put the tip of the tool right under the eyelid and filled the turret with whatever she was using to flush the eye. You are likely to make matters worse if you do not know what you are doing as you can force debris/infection deeper into the tissues.

Just to reassure you, this is not the same as your first chameleon! I'm sure he will be just fine.
 
Link said:
I am having problems right now just like you are. I have a tentative red. Every time he has a hard shed that happens. Just keep Flushing if it gets worse bringing it to the vet is always a possibility.
Click to expand...
Thanks Link I hope you get your situation resolved too
 
jajeanpierre said:
microracer24 That's a lot of misting for a panther in a solid walled cage, which is very good for an animal that is compromised such as your guy right now. I've never worked with Panthers, but even my quads don't get that much total minutes of misting and I keep them pretty wet. You might want to cut down your misting to two long sessions a day with multiple short sessions in between to keep the humidity up once you get his eye issue cleared up.

Can you post a picture of his urates? Sometimes when they don't defecate for a long time, the urates will have a yellow or orange color at one end. Is that what you are seeing?

Animals will close their eye and pull it back into the socket to protect it if it has some kind of an irritation either from an injury, debris or infection. Think about how you react to a minor scratch to your eye. You might be seeing that.

You'll find a lot of talk on here about Vitamin A deficiency, which can show up as eye problems as well as respiratory and mouth issues. Vitamin A is involved with the function of skin. A deficiency will cause thickening of the skin. The skin and linings of all kinds of places like the gut and various ducts won't function properly so things get blocked. Opportunist infections can take hold. While Vitamin A deficiency is a real problem with chameleons, I don't think Vitamin A deficiency is the reason your chameleon's eye is shut (although he also might be deficient of Vitamin A).

You earlier asked about what excess mucus from a respiratory infection looks like. I have never had an animal with a respiratory infection diagnosed by a vet so can't help you there, but I can tell reassure you that you will sometimes see those strings of saliva you describe. If you are worried about a respiratory infection watch his breathing when he is relaxed. In general, you shouldn't even see them take in a breath. It is not a good sign if you see them inhale deeply, which is not to be confused with when they inflate their lungs and puff up in a defense response. An animal with a compromised respiratory system will take deep, noticeable breaths. Chameleons don't seem to breath very often, so frequency is not something I notice even with an animal that has a compromised respiratory system (which I have had some experience with).

From your picture and your description, he seems hydrated and basically doing well except he has something wrong with his eye. He can likely wait for your vet appointment Monday. I hope you made the appointment with a vet who has some experience and interest in reptiles. I would not put anything in his eye except sterile artificial tears to try to keep the eye lubricated. I would just drip sterile artificial tears onto the eye many times a day. I think it a mistake to put anything into or on an animal's eye that isn't prescribed by a vet or sterile artificial tears or perhaps sterile saline solution designed for people. You will not be able to flush his eye yourself. When I had a similar issue my vet used a tool specifically for flushing the eye and put the tip of the tool right under the eyelid and filled the turret with whatever she was using to flush the eye. You are likely to make matters worse if you do not know what you are doing as you can force debris/infection deeper into the tissues.

Just to reassure you, this is not the same as your first chameleon! I'm sure he will be just fine.
Click to expand...
Thanks for taking the time to help me. What would you recommend for misting duration and intervals. Do they not require as much as a veiled?
 
The blood work came back normal...so that means no infection. So why does he look like this? This is not normal for him. He isn't sleeping in this picture just laying there with the left eye closed. I'm getting worried. He is eating and is still active during the day. What's the point of the eye drops if there is no infection? I don't want to give him an antibiotic for no reason.
20160920_200521.jpg
 
I was wrong. Called the vet and they said the blood test was more for checking organ functions. Nothing to do with infection. The vet also said there was no good way to test for a vitamin a deficiency. Is that correct?
 
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