Should You Call the Vet?

“It’s a lousy hamster.”

“It’s just a rat.”

“It’s just a parakeet.”

“I only paid twelve bucks for it.”

That’s what I’ve heard so many times from clients at the animal hospital who balked at leaving a deposit to have their little, inexpensive, sick pet treated. Often, this was after we’d already started to save its life. If the animal died ten minutes after arrival, while the doctors and technicians were working on it, the client naturally didn’t want to pay a dime. This used to make me so mad. Even more frustrating was that, most times, an animal was brought in on death’s door which made everyone extra tense.

Here’s the thing. When you have a pet like a dog or cat, you have many years to get attached and grow your human/pet relationship. These pets are considered “more worthy” of the expense of seeing a vet. With the smaller animals, a pet owner may not interact as much as they would with a more sophisticated pet or they’ve had it for only a few months and feel it’s too early to encounter any kind of illness. Maybe they bought it for their kid and didn’t expect any health problems in the first place.

I’m playing devil’s advocate here because the very frugal part of me understands these situations. I don’t like spending money at the vet either and I try not to, but I also can’t watch an animal suffer. The best thing to do is provide the best care in the first place, but even with love, attention and proper care, animals do get sick. Here are just a few tips for trying to determine if your pet needs to see the vet.

With caged animals it’s hard to recognize when the pet is sick. The advice I offer most often to new pet owners is to check your pet every day, at least in the morning and evening. Once you know a pet’s normal behavior, you’ll know better when things aren’t normal or seem out of place. If you suspect your guinea pig is scratching more than usual, he probably is. When he starts to develop a bald spot, that’s further proof and a good reason to call the vet.

Anytime a guinea pig, rabbit or rodent stops eating, it’s serious. Guinea pigs and rabbits have the type of digestion system that works continually. If there’s a stoppage, often called G.I. stasis, medication and syringe feedings may be prescribed. When rats or mice stop eating it’s highly unusual. This is pretty much what they seem to live for so there’s usually an underlying cause.

Birds will sometimes crouch in the bottom of their cage if they’re sick or sit on the perch puffed up. Sometimes, this means nothing, but if it continues for more than half a day, then there’s likely something going on. Small birds are tricky because they can go from just a little sick to dying in a matter of hours. Keep a close watch on a bird that’s acting lethargic and start looking for a vet that sees birds in case you have to take him there in the next 24 hours.

Reptiles, on the other hand, can be sick for weeks without showing any outward signs. You might notice their mouth or eyes looking different or ragged. They might show one eye stuck shut or you might notice less droppings in the enclosure. Iguanas that aren’t getting the proper nutrition in their diet can develop a noticeably crooked spine. The disease process, by this point, has usually progressed too far, but the iguana can still get back on track and continue to live with an improved diet.

I’ve only touched on a few illnesses here, but the point I want to make is that many of these things are treatable when the pet is in the care of a competent exotic veterinarian. Whether you want to spend the money or not is going to be a personal decision.  I try to weigh how veterinary treatment is going to extend my pet’s life. Will it give her a few more months? Is the pet young enough to benefit from treatment?

For instance, I recently had my two and a half year-old rat treated for mites knowing that rats only live three years. This particular rat, named Carrie, didn’t have any other problems, which is unusual for a rat that age. Usually, a rat can have at least one growth or the beginnings of a respiratory condition by then. These are the two things from which they generally die. I went ahead with mite treatment because the other younger rat had to be treated anyway and because I wanted to get Carrie as close to her three year lifespan as I could. It’s kind of a mission of mine. The other thing I had to ask myself was whether I could watch her continue to lose fur and scratch herself so maniacally. I couldn’t. So for my own peace of mind I had to bite the bullet and pay for a vet visit. It was worth it to me.

What will it take for you?

This is our rat, Sugar. While our other rat, Carrie, was showing hair loss and scratching like crazy, only Sugar tested positive for mites. Still, both pets had to be treated along with a thorough cleaning and de-miting of the cages.

Reptile in the House

Up until two years ago, I had no interest in keeping a reptile. My pet store and veterinary hospital experience taught me how much was involved in caring for a cold-blooded animal. I would need a heat lamp or heat pad or both. I would have to make a salad for the pet every day or provide live or killed food like crickets, mice goldfish or rats. Although I have no problem with snakes and I like watching them, I wasn't interested in having one and I really didn't like watching them eat. I liked the idea of keeping a box turtle or tortoise, but again, wasn't sure if I could provide the best environment. So I stayed away from reptiles even though they were offered to me free numerous times. In fact, most of my animals were acquired free of charge from customers or clients who had to give them up for one reason or another.

In 2007, I was writing a story about the Midwest Museum of Natural History in Sycamore, Illinois. Jack Hanna was to appear and I was given the awesome opportunity of covering the event. At that time, the museum had a special exhibit of live reptiles and I notice a cool looking lizard which I learned was a crested gecko (Rhacodactylus ciliatus). I'd never seen anything like it before and, as far as care and such, was only familiar with leopard geckos. The young man who owned the display said these lizards were fairly new to the pet scene, but were easy to care for because they do fine at room temperature. I made a mental note of this little lizard and decided someday I just might like to have one. I started looking for them in pet stores when I would go in for supplies, but didn't find any until 2010.

Under the guise of a birthday gift for our then 9 year-old son, I made arrangements to purchase one from a breeder. I had seen a crested at Petco, but it had already lost its tail and in this species the tail does not grow back. However, the price was right because it was marked down to $35 from $75.

In my search to find a breeder, I stumbled upon a link for Scott Smith’s All Animal Expo, held twice a month just about a one hour drive from my home. The website had a list of vendors that would take part in the event. I started talking to a breeder on the list by e-mail and made arrangements to buy a young “crestie” from her for $50. She was very knowledgeable and helpful. She raises her geckos on Repashy crested gecko diet which is just a powder that mixes with water and gets set out in a dish. No salad making or cricket feeding necessary. All the nutrition the crested needs, aside from that provided from natural sunlight, is in this diet. That little lizard was handed to us in a small, round, plastic container that measured about 4 inches wide and a little over an inch high. He barely filled the middle of it and a year and a half later he would never fit since he’s more than doubled in length and height.

We started housing him in the largest plastic Kritter Keeper we could buy. There were several nice reptile enclosures for sale at the expo, but I liked the lightweight plastic and secure lid (and the $20 price) of the one we chose. We put some nice driftwood logs in and a bunch of fake foliage. The breeder recommended only paper towels for the bottom of the enclosure so we complied. For one, it makes it easy to see if your lizard is giving off wastes, but it also prevents the gecko from ingesting other types of substrates like sand, soil, bark or litter.

We fed our cute baby gecko the Repashy mix in a tiny food dish from my daughter’s Littlest Pet Shop playset. This worked for a while, but I felt like he preferred to be up high so I looked for something better. I liked the fake rock feeding shelf I found at Pangea Reptile Supplies. It has two spaces for water and food cups and it sticks to the side of any cage with strong magnets. While we’ve observed our lizard on the feeding shelf and have noticed the food level go down in his dish, oddly enough, the whole time we’ve had him, we’ve never once seen him eat the Repashy. We buy him crickets once every 4 to 6 weeks, but he’s so fast, sometimes we can’t see him eat these either. That’s okay because I’m just so proud that he’s doing well and seems to be thriving. I took him to the veterinarian around his one year birthday and he weighed 13 grams. That was an interesting vet visit, but I’d like to talk more about that later, along with the one mistake I made that cost him his tail. Thanks for listening and feel free to ask questions. Here are a few pictures.