Hey yall, take two cause my draft didn’t save. I recently purchased a pet-only red tegu for my wife (it’s one of her two dream lizards) and now we’re looking for advice on some advanced care due his pretty significant health problems. Now, before anybody assumed we’re inexperienced and bought an animal because it looked cool, we own and operate an ethical breeding business with 3 breeding pairs and adding an additional female to our roster this weekend. We’re experienced, always do our homework, and have bioactive enclosures for all of our animals.
Now, our tegu, Bjorn is about 7 months old and was born with severe scoliosis and was on an expo table for a very low price. Now, in our area, that price tag would’ve attracted some individuals with little to no experience and he most likely would’ve gone to a loving home, but not a very experienced one. So far, Bjorn has been taken to our vet and had a full panel blood test, X-rays, and a wellness check to make sure that the scoliosis is our only concern, which thankfully, it is. He’s been freed of some very old stuck shed, been added onto oral syringes of calcium to get his levels back up, and is being spoiled with some fresh wild rabbit I hunted over the winter, beef heart, liver, ground poultry, a wide variety of greens, different feeder insects, and blackberries for a special sweet treat. Bjorn is also being heated by a 150w Arcadia UVB basking dome and an Arcadia full spectrum UVB light bar. He’s allowed out during the day to explore and get exercise, as well as swim therapy about 3-5 times a week, which has significantly improved his range of motion in his hind end, where the scoliosis is present. Since it’s warm enough outside, he also travels with us wherever we go for socialization and nature sunlight and fresh air.
My questions is, does anybody have any experience in this sort of thing or have an advice to better the quality of his life? My wife reached out to breeders and owners alike and they’ve never seen anything of the sort. Even our exotic vet mentioned above, who is a VERY good vet, had to reach out to a specialist to find out how to better care for Bjorn.
I’m attached a light and a dark contrasted versions of the X-ray showing his spinal discs all jumbled on top of each other.
Tl;dr: Young tegu has scoliosis, seeking advice to better his quality of life. Thank you in advance!