anorexic leopard gecko

Question
QUESTION: I have a male leopard gecko, and recently he has lost all his weight, and strength it seems.  He does not eat anymore and I'm getting rather worried.  No fresh stool for a fecal, as he is not eating.  What should I do?
Thanks,
Bevin

ANSWER: Hello Bevin,

A fecal sample definitely needs to be done.  I understand not being able to get a stool sample though.  So, what you will need to do is get some chicken or turkey babyfood & a tiny plastic dropper or syringe to get some food into him.
What type of substrate do you use, sand, tile, paper towels?  
What are the temperatures in the tank, are you using an undertank heater along with a low wattage basking light on one end?  
Is he hiding in his hide or cave a lot?
Do you provide calcium supplementation or a full spectrum UVB lighting?  While a lot of people do not think it is necessary to provide UVB lighting, I feel that they do benefit from low levels of UVB emissions to help with vitamin & mineral absorption.  
What types of foods have you fed him in the past?
 
Tracie

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: I'm already getting the baby food and dropper tomorrow (was reading your other answers earlier).  I have been using a calcium sand substrate (both male and female are adults, she is healthy), feeding mostly crickets with jurrasical with occasional meal-worms, using under tank heat and full spectrum basking bulb (fluorescent), and no, he is not moving much, so not really hiding.  He has come crawling up to me every time I'm in the tank though, and is still social with me.  Daytime temps reach close to 90, and nighttime temps drop to the middle 60's (66.7 now at 1:30a.m. with digital probe thermometer).  He's close to 7" long, possibly more, and is almost completely skeletal at this point.  The female has been gravid on and off all year with no success, even when I tried a higher humidity peat box, but at first I thought that was why he wasn't eating as much now.  Should i separate them and get him a different substrate for the time being?  I don't want to damage his morale with how bad he is, so I'm just not sure.
Thanks again,
Bevin

ANSWER: Hello Bevin,

Great, that you are getting the babyfood & the dropper tomorrow.  Hopefully, that will really  help her out quite a bit.  
Personally, I would get a different substrate as calcium based sand can cause terrible impactions.  I would use paper towels, non adhesive shelf liner, tiles, or felt.  We use felt, & it is very nice, easy to keep clean & risk free.  :-))
If you feel that he is being picked up then yes, separate them.  If not, then leave him in the tank so you don't stress him unnecessarily.   The less stress on him, the better.  
Ok, the temps look pretty good to me.  The humid hide is on top of the undertank heater, right?  
Do you have a water dish, too?  Do you have a cool end of around 78-82 for him to cool off for time during the day as well?

Keep me posted on him.

Tracie

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: So he's gotten baby food feedings a couple times now.  Pretty sure that he's not getting picked on by the female.  As far as the substrate goes, he is not on sand anymore, but coconut hulls.  I personally have had a bad experience with using paper towels and can't get tile for a while.  The humid hide?  Not sure what that is really, but the pad has a "this side up" marking one, and yes, that side is up.  Only one side of the tank is heated, and the other side does tend to stay in the lower 80's during the day.  The female is still very healthy and eating normally, so if this is a parasite, she has not been infected.  I do mist the tank usually about once a week to keep the humidity up, and the water dish is kept in the middle of the tank also to keep humidity levels at a decent percent.
Thanks,
Bevin

Answer
Hello Bevin,

Ok, that is fine.  The coconut husk will be fine since that should be hard for them to ingest.  A humid hide is just a cave with moss inside of it, kept moist every day, on the warm side so it will help with shedding issues.  The entire tank doesn't need to be humid, just a small portion in the hide/cave.  They are desert reptiles, from Pakistan, so humidity is not really necessary other than for shedding.    
It is possible that he does have parasites.  You will need to be careful as the female if she comes across feces, or accidentally ingests feces then she can infect herself & become ill.  
Has he gone to the bathroom at all lately?  
Leopard geckos are difficult to treat, once they get parasites, or some other type of infection, etc.  

Tracie