Living things need water to survive, and thus lack of enough within the body could result in devastating implications. Therefore, despite bearded dragons’ original desert-like habitats, they often need proper hydration to healthily survive, whether in open space or captivity.
This is because, severe dehydration could kill your beardie much faster than other pets prompting the need to fast identify associated signs of dehydration and swiftly rehydrate them before severe implications.
Signs/Symptoms of a Dehydrated Beardie
Understanding these manifestations would thus immensely assist you in identifying the warning signs early and applying the appropriate remedies before the condition worsens. Some of these manifestations include;
Wrinkled skin
This implies that your beardie’s skin will present with abnormal wrinkles and loosely attached skin to the body. Subsequently, the skin also loses its elasticity, thus, its ability to stretch out or return to its regular shape and size. Nonetheless, it is also vital to understand that this symptom could result from other factors like stress, old age, fear response, being underweight, among others, and not only dehydration. A skin pinch test is usually performed to confirm this, deriving conclusions from the elasticity rate outcome.
Sunken eyes
This is another major sign of dehydration among bearded dragons. The eyes usually seem sleepy, dark, receded, and hollow with loose surrounding skin as the eyeballs sink towards the socket bone. Moreover, the vessels around the beardie’s eyes will also appear prominently.
Saliva thickness
This is usually a straightforward sign of dehydration among bearded dragons. As such, when upon close examination of your beardie’s mouth, you come across thick double-strand saliva stretching between its mandibles, you should immediately rehydrate as this is a major symptom of fluid deficiency.
Decrease in appetite
Dehydration among beardies also manifests as a reluctance to catch prey or even eat.
As a result, the beardie may go for long periods without eating. This is a very dangerous predicament that could even lead to death.
Lethargy
A consistent lack of energy has also often been associated with dehydration among bearded dragons. As such, the animal will mostly remain idle, not showing any interest in playing or moving around. If they decide to, they would be very slow while struggling every moment. This should raise the warning signs of dehydration.
Poop changes
This is another simple way of identifying a dehydrated beardie by checking its fecal matter. Poop change could result from the beardie’s natural body systems trying to minimize water loss. As such, you will find the bearded dragon’s poop being chalky, white, and dry. This is unlike that of a healthy hydrated beardie which is usually soft, brown, and uniform solid.
Some of these signs might be indicative of other underlying issues. You should always check for more than one at a time for a sound conclusion on the beardie’s dehydration status.
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My name is Brad and I am the main editor of BeardieZilla.com.
The only goal of this site is quite simply to be able to help you. To help you by the means of my experiment, of the relation which I maintain with my bearded dragon as well as some of my knowledge about beardies.
I hope that you will find answers to some of your most pressing questions here.
Thank you for stopping by and enjoy the blog!
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