constipation

Question
QUESTION: My bearded dragon will be a year in the mid of august and he is still on news paper and paper towels. I do have a 75 gallon tank for him but he is not in it yet because i dont have a stand for it yet. For some reason he has been eating the news paper and the paper towels! Trust me my bearded dragon eats enough because i feed it every day. someone told me that i need to go to sand scince he is eating the paper, and ever scince he has ate the paper he has been constipated! he looks really lathargic, he is usally really really active. When every he wasnt constipated he would run all over the cage and when he saw the cage open or me getting his crickets out he would go crazy! What should i do?

Kaelin

ANSWER: Hello Kaelin,

No please do not go to sand because he will eat that also.  
You might want to just take out the paper towels & the newspaper until we get this figured out.
Are you using a UVB light?  If so, what type & brand are you using, a flourescent tube bulb or a compact/coil light?  How old is it?
Are you supplementing calcium at all?  Since he is not quite a year, you still need to be giving calcium 5 times per week right now.  How often do you feed him?  What do you feed him?
Can you post a picture of him?

Tracie

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Shela Man   QUESTION: i am using a 2 or 3 month old uvb flourescent tube buld. it is a repti-glo 5.0 15 watt and the brand name is Exo Terra. i am supplementing through the crickets diet by feeding them calcium fortified food. i feed him everyday. i feed him crickets but 2 or 3 times a week i feed him veggies that have been thawed out.

ANSWER: Hello Kaelin,

What type of UVB light did you have prior to the Reptiglo 5 flourescent tube bulb?
The Reptiglo 5 flourescent tube bulb is a safe bulb & a good light but unfortunately, it is such a a weak UVB light that it really does not provide strong enough emissions for him.  They have a very high requirement for UVB exposure.  If he had a weak bulb prior to the one you are using now, then he is probably in early stages of metabolic bone disease though he does not "appear" to have any external signs of it yet other than being a little underdeveloped.
The main problem when they do not have adequate UVB exposure is that they cannot properly absorb calcium or synthesize D3 correctly which, will leave them vulnerable to malnutrition & bone problems & stunted growth.
Your feeding sounds pretty good.  How many crickets does he eat when he does eat them?  
I think that the reason he is eating the paper, is because he is looking for calcium sources, or vitamins that he is lacking.  So, do not put any sand in there because he will just eat that also.

The best thing that you can do is to get him a Reptisun 10 flourescent tube bulb which is a much stronger.  When they are hypocalemic, it can cause a myriad of problems & constipation is one of them.  If it gets bad enough, he could suffer a prolapse from straining.  The smooth muscles of the GI tract are controlled by calcium ions & if he is not absorbing properly his system will not work effectively.  

Overall he looks pretty good.  He could use some size on the base of his tail & some extra size on his limbs, too.  He is very handsome.  It is hard to tell from the picture, but does his mouth close all of the way?  I was just checking to make sure he did not have an overbite developing.
How long is he & how much does he weigh, do you know?

Tracie

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QUESTION: he eats about 10 - 13 crickets and that is all that i put in there and he eats all of them. he is about 10 inches long with a kinked tail though(i mesured him with a ruler, if that helps?). i am not sure how much he weighs but i know that he is pretty fat because everyone who sees him says he is fat.  his mouth is closed all the way but the person that i got the bearded dragon from lived next do to me and one of her youngest bearded dragon had an over bite. and she said that he was fat to but i dont think that i over feed her even though he eats every thing that i give him. so should i go ahead and start putting calcium on the crickets even though they are eating calcium fortified food? and he seems to have paper towel stuck in his butt cause i tried to pull some out and it was paper towel. . how am i supposed to build up his leg and tail size? oh and he does have a kinked tail if that has anything to with the size of his tail? i think that he is a bit small for his age scince he will be 1 in august and my cousin has a bearded dragon that is younger than mine and is twice as big, and its a female! the bulb that i was using before i dont know what kind it was but i did get it from somebody i know and i didnt know how old it was but it stopped working and i had to get a new one.

Kaelin

Answer
Hello Kaelin,

He is very small for a 1 year old dragon.  They usually get 16-20 inches on average unless you get a german giant.  
The UVB lighting is very important so I highly suggest getting the Reptisun 10 flourescent tube bulb as soon as you can.  It will need to be switched out every 6 months.  
A kinked tail means that he is developing metabolic bone disease so if it is not corrected soon, he is going to become very ill & will cost you alot of money to get him back to health.  It is much easier now, to get him a better light & feed him more than to pay loads of money at the vets when he gets sick.
When they are young up to around 10 months of age, they should be fed 2-3 times per day as many crickets or feeders as they want.  Most babies & juvies can eat upwards of 50-100 appropriately sized crickets per day.  That is probably another reason he has not grown properly because he has not gotten enough protein.  I think you should try to increase his crickets.  He needs to be eating at least 50 per day right now.  
I do not know if he will grow to his potential & how much his growth has been stunted.  Just feeding the crickets a good gutload that has calcium in them is not enough calcium for him, no.  As a baby to a juvie, he needs calcium on his food 5 times per week.  
Anytime a dragon develops either an overbite or an underbite that means he is developing metabolic bone disease.  It is extremely important to get the proper UVB lighting.  There are not very many good UVB lights.  The best one in the US is the Reptisun 10 flourescent tube bulb.  There are mercury vapor bulbs that emit triple the UVB or more, of the tube bulbs.  Those are the Megaray, the T-rex active UV heat or the Solar Glo all of which are good.  The Megaray is the best.  You can only use that if your tank is a 40 gallon or larger.  It will need to be 12 inches from your dragon & be used in a ceramic base light fixture that will support 250+ wattage for safety.
Your last UVB light sounded pretty old, especially if someone gave it to you.  So he has most likely not had any UVB light for most of his life.  

Tracie