Panther dropping eggs

[ChromaChameleons]

I've got a female Panther . Shes about 2 years old. I've had her since she was 12 weeks old. She has successfully layed 4 clutches and has always been a strong and healthy cham. For The past few days she has been dropping eggs, ( 6 eggs over 3 days), from high up on her vine. She does roam the floor of her cage and is definetely restless. I've had her in a bucket on 3 occasions over the past week. Its the same bucket she has used several times in the past . I've also given her oral calcium glucanate yesterday and the day before to insure she has adequate calcium to do the laying . The eggs seem particularly small and prior to dropping them , she was gaping terribly as though she couldn't breath. My guess is that the eggs are not ready yet to be layed but that she has a large clutch and that they are pressing internally. Oh and yes, she is as big as a house.

Any experiences with a similar issue.... please share.

 

[Will Hayward]

Harry, The last panther I kept (was given to me) that dropped eggs (duds) instead of laying them, shortly later prolapsed. The prolapsed organs were put back in and there were no further prolapses (thought she passed away anyways). I am absolutely positive that the two happenings were in relation to each other. I'm now very suspicious of any females that drop eggs rather than lay them.

Just FYI. I suspect that most route causes of egg dropping that is not from improper laying opportunities would be something potentially devastating health wise.

I'd take miniature buried eggs over well developed dropped eggs anyday.

 

[ChromaChameleons]

Thanks Will. I definitly have my reservations of what is actually going on with this female. Your suggestion that there may be something else going on here is quite probable. She seemed to be gravid a few months ago and nothing came of it. Always being a big girl , I never suspected much , but now in retrospect , I believe she may have broken an egg or never layed a small unfertile clutch. Or possibly had a single egg from a previous clutch hang up and never got expelled.

 

[kinyonga]

I would get her to a vet ASAP.

 

[Will Hayward]

Personally, I've never found a vet that would know what to do in this situation...? I don't think so at least. I suppose the only thing one could do as a test would be to do an ultrasound and attempt to see the eggs? What other tests would one preform?

 

[Steven Reecy]

I've got a female Panther . Shes about 2 years old. I've had her since she was 12 weeks old. She has successfully layed 4 clutches and has always been a strong and healthy cham. For The past few days she has been dropping eggs, ( 6 eggs over 3 days), from high up on her vine. She does roam the floor of her cage and is definetely restless. I've had her in a bucket on 3 occasions over the past week. Its the same bucket she has used several times in the past . I've also given her oral calcium glucanate yesterday and the day before to insure she has adequate calcium to do the laying . The eggs seem particularly small and prior to dropping them , she was gaping terribly as though she couldn't breath. My guess is that the eggs are not ready yet to be layed but that she has a large clutch and that they are pressing internally. Oh and yes, she is as big as a house.

Any experiences with a similar issue.... please share.

Do you think that the eggs are fertile, or infertile? I had a panther lay infertile eggs this way, but she dropped them all in one day. She was fine after that. The fact that the eggs are passing is a good sign, but the fact that she's doing it over a few days is bad. I think you're right that she has too many eggs. How has she been eating, and where if she is fertile, or autogenerating, how far is she from her due date? If you think she gave up eating too early, I'd try to make a food slurry that was super nutricious and try to get her to eat it, but only a small amount as her stomach is probably so compressed little can fit in there.

If I were you, I'd give her more than just the one laying area. Has she dug at all? You sure the moisture content of the soil is good?

Steve

 

[stevereecy]

Do you think that the eggs are fertile, or infertile? I had a panther lay infertile eggs this way, but she dropped them all in one day. She was fine after that. The fact that the eggs are passing is a good sign, but the fact that she's doing it over a few days is bad. I think you're right that she has too many eggs. How has she been eating, and where if she is fertile, or autogenerating, how far is she from her due date? If you think she gave up eating too early, I'd try to make a food slurry that was super nutricious and try to get her to eat it, but only a small amount as her stomach is probably so compressed little can fit in there.

If I were you, I'd give her more than just the one laying area. Has she dug at all? You sure the moisture content of the soil is good?

Steve

Some follow up information. Last night I was reading Linda Davidson's book, and I just happened to read the section pertaining to this issue. That book said that if a female chameleon is dropping eggs incorrectly, in their experience, the best thing to do for the survival of the female is to give it Oxytocin. The book implied that there is a high correlation between incorrect deposition of eggs and (later) stuck eggs. Its got something to do with the birth canal (tube?) becoming sticky. Regardless of whether the eggs are viable, oxytocin may be your best bet.

The Davidson book also has good information on oxytocin dosage, but I'm at work and can't get to it until tonight. If anyone here has that info, please post it. I've taken chams to the vets here locally and have received overdoses on meds until I got wise and started bringing in my own dosage recommendations...

Steve

 

[Kent67]

Nice find Steve.

Says Linda, "The drug, when given at the proper rate, is safe and effective. Usually a female will start delivery within a few minutes to an hour after Oxytocin has been administered by injection. The drug is injected intramuscularly at the upper base of the tail at the rate of .05 I.U. per 70 grams of body weight." She also says that if after two injections a female is still unable to lay, they die. Upon necropsy in these cases they've found that the oviducts are "contorted." Giving too much Oxytocin can make the oviducts sticky as well, disallowing the eggs to pass.

As an interesting side note, I was going through some old herp magazines, etc and found a dot matrix printout of part of the manuscript of the book from when Linda was working on it. Geez, I'm getting old.

 

[ChromaChameleons]

Hi All;

Thanks for the replies. Great input from the membership. My female is not digging in either her bucket ( external to her cage) or her pot of soil ( in her cage). I have checked moisture of the soil /sand mix. It should be good to go. She has been roaming all over her cage and is defenitely trying to follow through with securing a laying site, but something is preventing her from digging .

She will be 30 days gravid on the 10th , thats two days from now, and this should be her expected laying date , taking her history of gestation into account. She has been off her food for about 5 days and I did get her to eat 2 butterworms today, but shes definetely off crix.

She has not been in the bucket all day and by tommorrow morning it will have been 36 hours since she has been in the bucket. No new dropped eggs in the last 24 hours.

They do appear as though they are fertile, but smallish, compared to previous eggs from her.

I have had 3 chams to the vet in the past for similar issues over the past 5 years. These occurances are relatively rare for me . I estimate 3 occurances in 50 clutches layed. My experience with 2 different vets is that they want to do xrays, even though the image will not provide info to further the treatment. Invariably , each instance has included Oxytoxin, with one successful administration and 2 failed. The last attempt at Oxytoxin inducement resulted in 3 administrations of constantly increased dosage over 14 hours , with not so much as a single contraction.

I will administer oral calcium glucanate and place the girl in the bucket in the AM . I expect that , now that she has stopped dropping eggs , is no longer gaping , is roaming around and has a good strong aura about her ; that she now has a good chance of successful egg deposition.

I'll post an update within a day or two....

 

[Will Hayward]

Good luck Harry.

 

[Steven Reecy]

Hi All;

Thanks for the replies. Great input from the membership. My female is not digging in either her bucket ( external to her cage) or her pot of soil ( in her cage). I have checked moisture of the soil /sand mix. It should be good to go. She has been roaming all over her cage and is defenitely trying to follow through with securing a laying site, but something is preventing her from digging .

She will be 30 days gravid on the 10th , thats two days from now, and this should be her expected laying date , taking her history of gestation into account. She has been off her food for about 5 days and I did get her to eat 2 butterworms today, but shes definetely off crix.

She has not been in the bucket all day and by tommorrow morning it will have been 36 hours since she has been in the bucket. No new dropped eggs in the last 24 hours.

They do appear as though they are fertile, but smallish, compared to previous eggs from her.

I have had 3 chams to the vet in the past for similar issues over the past 5 years. These occurances are relatively rare for me . I estimate 3 occurances in 50 clutches layed. My experience with 2 different vets is that they want to do xrays, even though the image will not provide info to further the treatment. Invariably , each instance has included Oxytoxin, with one successful administration and 2 failed. The last attempt at Oxytoxin inducement resulted in 3 administrations of constantly increased dosage over 14 hours , with not so much as a single contraction.

I will administer oral calcium glucanate and place the girl in the bucket in the AM . I expect that , now that she has stopped dropping eggs , is no longer gaping , is roaming around and has a good strong aura about her ; that she now has a good chance of successful egg deposition.

I'll post an update within a day or two....

Wow, hope it turns out OK. Its like she pushed eggs out of the way to make room for the expansion. The fact that she doesn't seem to be in distress is a good thing. You're closer to the situation, and my advice was a "playing the odds" type answer, so I won't argue my standpoint. The calcium glucanate sounds like a good idea because she needs it, and probably needs hydration too. Wonder if pedialyte wouldn't make sense to help her endure the muscular strain she's about to undergo?

Keep us updated. Real curious how many eggs she'll lay.

Steve

 

[BIGGUN]

Hi there.

Any eggs yet?

Kevin

 

[ChromaChameleons]

No.. she dropped 8 eggs from her vine over a period of about 3 days. Very small eggs at that . She is still big as a house and has been alternated one day in and one day out of her bucket over the past 5 days. Still nothing ....

Shes healthy, strong and very mobile. She has eaten about 5 food items in the past 7 days, very minimal appetite. She has also passed stools, so her plumbing is working . According to my estimate , she is overdue by 2 or 3 days, but the size of the dropped eggs would suggest otherwise.

I'm remaining patient.

 

[BIGGUN]

Sorry to hear that they're not here yet.

Glad to hear she's still doing alright!

Keep us posted as the curiosity is too much to take.

Thanks,
Kevin

 

[ChromaChameleons]

Update

I took my female to the vet today. She is about 5 - 10 days overdue and she has been digging shallow holes and attempting to lay with no result. Her hydration isn't great , but her fat stores in her casque and cheeks are all gone. I did get her to eat 3 butterworms this evening .

So, I did get over to the vet today and we have administered 2 doses of oxytocin and one injection of calcium. The first produced about 5 minutes of involuntary contractions. The second produced further contractions that have been going on for about 2 hours now. She has layed 6 eggs. That makes the total so far of 14 eggs including the ones she dropped last week. Im going to give her the night to rest and first thing tomorrow , she gets butterworms , if she'll take them and water via syringe , if she doesnt drink and an oral dose of calcium. An hour or two later , Ill inject her with the 3rd dose of oxytocin.

Shes weak, but not out of the game yet. Its looking good....

 

[BIGGUN]

Can't wait for tomorrow's post.

Good luck.


Kevin

 

[ChromaChameleons]

Thursday AM.... no more eggs since last night.... gave her water , she wouldnt eat any butterworms. Gave her oral liquid calcium and injected last of the oxytocin.... now waiting.....

 

[PardalisGirl]

Hoping for good outcome........

I was away from the forum for a few weeks when this thread started. I'm hoping there are not damaged eggs further up the pipeline that caused the initial problem. Or if there are any, that they will be fully expelled. I have nothing else to add to this except that I really hope your girl pulls through. Will be keeping my fingers crossed, thinking about her and looking for more updates.

 

[Nicodemayo]

Really hope she gets back to full health. Im keeping a close eye on your updates!

 

[ChromaChameleons]

Wow... what a great bunch of members here on this forum....thx for the concern.

My female is taking a break for now. She is still going to ground and she was in the bucket earlier , but her strength is not serving her well right now.

Her casque and cheeks are hollow, but her grip is still good and she can still resist her mouth being forced open. And she still has a formidable bite.

Ive gotten a butterworm in her and water and more liquid calcium.

I called the vet this afternoon and I'll be picking up 2 doses of oxytocin and one injectable calcium tomorrow and I will administer them tomorrow late afternoon.

Her last clutch was 25 eggs and this one is 15 eggs so far, so I expect that from the last clutch and her size ( still big ), there are probably more. The eggs so far look opaque and poorly calcified . The ones dropped last week are all moldy and shriveling . But they are about average to slightly small in size.