HELP, CHAMELEON HAS FALLEN....swollen leg

[Eric Adrignola]

The parasite is a protozoan. It damages the lining of the intestines, and can go into the other organs as well, if animal is compromised. My animals were all Wild Caught, and all had coccidia in their sytems when they arrived. They were fine, and treatment was out of the question, since albon can be very rough. I had them over 2 years. When I was out of town for training, the temps got down very low for an extended period. They seemed ok.

The next winter, I had little to worry about, I thought. Undortunatly, for several days, some doors were left open, and the room got down to the 30's at night, several nights in a row - and not much warmer in the day. I was out of town, and did not notice until I checked the High/Low memory on my thermometer.

All my animals that had low levels of coccidia (I'm talking 1-3 per slide, per fecal - very low levels), ended up with higher levels after this. They went up and down on the medicine (I used appertex). Eventually, they all died form the infection, wiht severe damage to their intestines.

I had some baby calyptratus in the room with them, only abou 2 months old. They showed no affects from such cold. Neither did my other animals. Only the WC ones with low-levels of coccidia.

That severe stress allowed the protozoan to esentially take over, eventually killing them after many many months of wsting away and fighting infection.

I have never heard of it going to the legs or feet though - this is a protozoan that is common in the intestine, I dont' even kow if it's possible. Anyone ever hear of this?

 

[JackAttack]

thank you for sharing eric

the vet is telling me that the parasite attacks the intestintes ( which you have stated) and thus doesnt allow protien to be absorbed by the intestine. it is then distributed in the body, causing very weak muscles and feet. i also read this article on it, and it described what happened to jack to a t............he had a trauma with the fall, and perhaps he had the parasite all along, but his immune system was compromised. i hope we caught it in time, its been about 3 weeks since his first symptoms started...........

here's the link to the article i read....

http://chamworld.blogspot.com/2008/01/parasites-warning-this-health-chapter.html

ok, so worse case scenero, after about 4 weeks, we think jack is better, and the parasite can come back? then what?.......... im almost afraid to hear the answer.......... jack wasnt eating prior to this medicine either, he had been put on baytril, because the vet thought there was another infection. as soon as he started taking that, he stopped eating. today i force fed him 5 crickets, once they were in his mouth, he chewed them up as usual. he is recieving fluid under his skin on the days he takes the albon. i have moved him to a small cage with one vine and not a lot of leaves, in an effort to contain the parasite when he poops. i figure less places to poop, less chance it can stick around. do you have any other tips for his husbandry while he is recovering??? thanks so much,
jackattack

ps i am in alberta canada

 

[JackAttack]

also, have you ever heard of this spreading to humans? what happens if it does?

 

[Docility]

sanitize after messing with anything like that. i do when im around healthy animals, because we are susceptible to anything if given the right conditions

 

[Eric Adrignola]

I'm fairly certai that it does not spread to us from them - we can get coccidia, but I believe not these strains/species. Regardless, keep things clean. I do not think there is anyting to fear about gettign it from them. Animal to animal, yes. Animal to human (zoonosis) no.

 

[Eric Adrignola]

Sounds like your vet is suspecting that the coccidia is causing gout. The swellings on the feet matches gout. What do you feed the feeder insects? Vegetables, dog/cat/fish food?

 

[JackAttack]

we feed them romaine and carrots most of the time........ occasionally they get apple slices as well. that is for the crickets, when we have worms, he usually eats them too fast for them to have a chance to eat anything. all are dusted with calcium every other feeding, with a multivitamin + D3 every other friday.

 

[Eric Adrignola]

can you post some updated pics of him? Or maybe upload a minute or so of him movign around, etc.?

 

[JackAttack]

hello eric,

on page 6 of this thread, there is a link to a youtube video " jack moving around"...........this was what jack looked like when he was trying to move around his branches.....continuous falling. he is in a smaller cage now, with almost no drop to the bottom, until his grip becomes better. he looks in the video that he is lugging his back legs around, using their muscles, but not their feet. have a look........... i will post a video of him now after 3 treatments of albon..........he's still not eating on his own and has a pretty shaky grip. let me know what you think

 

[JackAttack]

also, on page 1 i believe, there are pics of his legs........they are still swollen like this and he doesnt use his feet to grip anything, its very weak..

 

[Eric Adrignola]

I saw those pics - I was wondering if they had changed. Nobody's mentined his eyes. He's got loose skin on his eyes, and his casque is fairly bulged out. I've seen chameleons with swellings all over - head, eyes, legs. Not sure what caused it in those cases, but it was certainly nutritional. He does not seem that bad, but the rear leg thing is VERY interesting to me.

My male veiled got a severe burn years ago. He was fine, but badly burned, so I get some baytril as a preventative from the vet. He went downhill, as I had said, and was fine the day after I stopped treatment. His legs were permanantly weakened after this - his knee due to the burn, obviously (cooked to the bone). Weird thing, was that his legs were weak and nearly useless, but his feet gripped as strong as ever. He showed these signs only after a few days, or a week after the baytril treatment. I suspected nerve damage from the burns, but I had always wondered why it took so much time. His legs were weaker than your guys, but he moved the exact same way - see in the video how he's using his tail as a limb, bringing it forward, gripping the branch like a fifth leg? Same thing.

I wonder.

 

[JackAttack]

hhmmmm, sounds similar, except that jack's legs seem to work "ok", its his feet that have almost no grip. he continues to "carry" his back legs around, swinging them forward, and ive seen him use his legs as leverege when climbing up a steeper branch, just that his grip is useless. today we saw a bit of improvement in his front feet, they seemed a little stronger, less shaky and "parkinsons" like.

i didnt know that loose skin on his eyes was a bad thing, i thought that when they were sunken in it was bad. he's had loose eyes like that for as long as i can remember though......and his casque? i thought he had a smaller casque than most veiled males?......tomorrow i will take recent pics of him and post them on here. i think that people will be shocked, because he does not appear sick at all......its really pretty strange. he's still not eating on his own, but he does crunch up the crickets when i put them in his mouth. today he hissed at me for the first time in about 3 weeks, so i took it as a good sign. i also saw him use his tongue last night, he shot it out at something on a leaf, but there was nothing there. at least i know he still has the energy/ability to use it. i'll post the pics in the am thanks for all of your input, keep it coming.

 

[JackAttack]

oh, and just to clarify.......jack was on a medication for the first week, but he continued to go downhill.........this is when his other back leg and front legs became weak as well, he was not moving around, and was VERY weak, but he was still eating. i took him to the vet again, and this is when the baytril was prescribed. jack was weak before the baytril, but the baytril caused him to stop eating, and he hasnt eaten on his own since. he only had 4 doese of baytril (0.04), before they called me with the results of the fecal, and here we are now, on albon. he's now had 3 consecutive days of the med, from here on in its one day on , one day off, until meds are finished.

 

[spec and spot]

i feel sorry for you. i was just wondering do you clean out his cage if so how often cleaning it out (taking out the poop,and claning the cage generaly)because cleaning it might help.

 

[Eric Adrignola]

OK, I misunderstood. I'm not talking about the casque height, but the "meat" bulging out the sides. It's common, and not usually a sign of somethign bad. BUT, it the eyes are bugged out, nd the casque is bugged out, and the legs are swollen, it can all be related.

 

[JackAttack]

hhhmmm........okee dokie, i'll post some pics today.

 

[JackAttack]

ok, here are some more recent pics of jack, this is how he looks all the time, just laying on the branches, occasionally a limb will hang down and dangle. you can see that they are swollen, but to me, he "looks" like he should be healthy.........its so frustrating, because it doesnt seem as though he is getting any better . also, here is a link to the latest vid of him walking around......you have to watch closely to see that he is just moving his back legs, not really using them, but you can see how weak he is.

 

[JackAttack]

here is the link to the video...........

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ygC1r-W0aoE

 

[Dave Weldon]

...you can see that they are swollen, but to me, he "looks" like he should be healthy...

Howdy,

You are right about the feet/ankle/leg swelling. It is especially noticeable in the #3 photo . I wonder about some kind of systemic infection or maybe even organ (kidney?) failure .

 

[JackAttack]

well dave,

the vet told me that if this drug doesnt cure him, ( albon for the coccidia) that it is most likely kidney problems. how does that happen in a perfectly healthy cham? just out of nowhere??? she also suggested that perhaps he had gone septic from an infection, and now the infection was in his blood.