He's a dollbaby!! You would never know that is the same glider unless you told them! AWESOME job with Reep! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />
Glider Kids - Badger and Bonnie, Pepsi and Grace, Victoria.. ahem..I mean ummm..Victor! and Isabella <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />
Current Research, Studies & Resources
Re: Body Language of a Sick glider
[Re: ]
#77415 05/02/0610:56 PM05/02/0610:56 PM
I will have to locate pics later as I just updated my system and haven't transfered info from my old hard drive yet.
My Emma was having issues with her liver and kidneys. I didn't know it as she showed little signs at first. The first I noticed was that she had a hole on her back right between her shoulder blades that wouldn't heal. I tried doing what I could at home to treat it but she wouldn't heal. I took her to the vet and they gave me some antibiotics for her and I separated her from her cage mates. She did heal from the wound then. I put her back in with her cage mates and after a couple weeks I noticed that Skittles seemed to not want her around. That is a sign to watch for too. If a glider is continually being attacked by their cage mates that they have gotten along with for years look closer at the glider being attacked. Anyway, I decided that if Skittles was going to keep attacking Someone needed to leave. I think I took Skittles out thinking that she was the problem. Then I switched so that nobody got too lonely. Then I noticed that Emma wasn't eating and was looking scruffy like she wasn't grooming well. Contacted the vet again and we got her back on the antibiotics thinking that the infection from her wound had grown internally after the wound healed. I was force feeding her and giving her medicine and anytime she showed any interest in any food I'd let her eat as much as she wanted. She would steal canned kitten food when I went to feed the cats and ate a good portion of a peach that was sitting on the counter once. I could hardly get her to eat mealies even though she loved those, had to stop giving those when they started making her heave whenever she tried to eat them. During this time she also lost weigh dramatically and very quickly. One morning I went in to give her medicine and she usually would come to the front of the cage when I opened it but this time she just sat, acting kinda funny in the back of the cage. I reached in to get her and realized she was having a seizure. I immediately got her in a pouch and called the vets office when I was on my way there. The seizure continued all the way to the vets office and when she stopped seizing everything stopped. They rushed her back and gave her oxygen (as well as they could with a mask big enough to put all of her into. They did still detect a heartbeat at this point even though she wasn't breathing on her own. A couple minutes later she died. Necropsy showed that there were lacerations on both kidneys and the liver. looked like fatty liver disease (well known in cats) and grape toxicity (well known in dogs) thus leaving us with a big fat zero as to actual cause of these organs shutting down. I will try to get pics soon. Sorry it was so long.
Re: Body Language of a Sick glider
[Re: ]
#77418 06/10/0608:12 AM06/10/0608:12 AM
[:"green"]Jennifer, Thanks for sharing your story with us so we can all learn from it. I will add the symptom of cage mates attacking to the page on my site. If you haven't seen the page yet, you can check it out at: Symptoms of a Sick Glider. (It is a compilation of the symptoms everyone has listed on this thread so far. I will update it as needed to keep it current.)
Excellent thread Jen! Since you started the thread I think once it is pretty well played out it would be a good idea to go back and organize and GC should make a sticky out of it.
One indicator that I did not see mentioned is that quiet often when a glider is feeling poorly they will sometimes change sleeping places or sleep alone. And they will hide behind toy boxes, wheels, under floor pads and in general try to stay out of sight. Gliders will exhibit multiple symptoms of illness. To me the most frightening look is that certain look a glider with terminal illness has in their eyes. It is hard to describe but when you look into their eyes you seem to instinctively know the end is near. Charlie H
I am glad this got bumped. I forgot about it and I promised some pictures. So here they are. Emma is my avatar and in that picture she is healthy. Here are a couple of pictures just a few days before she passed.
Re: Body Language of a Sick glider
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#77422 07/03/0609:15 AM07/03/0609:15 AM
Jennifer you brought up a very important observation. Quiet often when a glider is attacked by cage mates it is mistaken for dominance issues, mating, or other behavioral issues. An unhealthy glider or a glider with a compromised immune system quiet often suffer from attacks by healthy gliders. We could easily get off topic here but more often than many realize unhealthy gliders are considered as outcasts. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/thumb.gif" alt="" /> Charlie H
Very true CharlieH. I believe that in the wild it is a "safety instinct" as a sick glider can attract predators and endanger the entire colony so the healthy gliders will chase the sick glider away or kill it to avoid the predator issue. I think that is what was happening with Skittles and Emma. Skittles is a rescue I have and she has had difficulty adjusting to living with us. I think her instincts kicked in with Emma. If I had realized that was the case I could have had Emma tested and maybe caught the illness sooner. Definately something to be aware of and watch out for.
Re: Body Language of a Sick glider
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#77426 09/21/0609:58 PM09/21/0609:58 PM
I'd like to add one, before my female died, and I knew she was sick, while I was waiting for the vet to open, she would look for crevises to go into, like the inside of my elbow, or she would nose in-between my fingers when I was holding her
Re: Body Language of a Sick glider
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#151857 10/02/0612:11 PM10/02/0612:11 PM
It might be more helpful to view jaundice as a sign pointing to the cause of illness as opposed to an illness of itself. Jaundice is a sign of liver or bone marrow issues at work, but not the origin of the problem. Much like fever indicates an infection is present, jaundice points to these organs indicating that something is up. It is relatively rare for either the fever itself or jaundice itself to do damage in most instances. Also of interest, some causes of jaundice are self-limiting and spontaneously resolve, some others are able to be treated if diagnosed and therapy is begun, while some are not amenable to help and a bad outcome is inevitable. A veterinarian visit is certainly warranted to help those that are treatable.
Re: Body Language of a Sick glider
[Re: Dancing]
#153468 10/05/0605:43 PM10/05/0605:43 PM
There hasn't been a post on this thread for a year.
But, as a new glider owner, I wanted to post here to say THANK YOU to each of you who added to this thread.
The initial story and pictures of Gimli made me cry. How brave of you to post those pictures of the beautiful, sad boy! Thank you for your gift to Rocket and me -
Alden "Animals can communicate quite well. And they do. And generally speaking, they are ignored." Alice Walker
Mom to Valhalla; 6 cats; 1 macaw; 2 hedgehogs; and very many great gliders!
(plus the 2 skin kids) valkyriegliders.com
Kyrie, nothing will ever fill the hole you left in my heart.
Re: Body Language of a Sick glider
[Re: ValkyrieMome]
#204750 01/21/0707:48 PM01/21/0707:48 PM
all of these posts are great! i have learned a little more about glider illness, which is always a wonderful thing. i do, however, have one question... off all the illnesses listed, there has been no mention of pouch infections. i have a female who has been a little sensitive around the pouch area- this is what got me to read this post- and i realized that i really dont know much about pouch infections. so if anyone has any desciptions or PICS WOULD BE GREAT i would really appreciate it! oh, and info on what to expect for treatment of a pouch infection would be wonderful too.
Re: Body Language of a Sick glider
[Re: Dancing]
#221771 02/20/0711:10 PM02/20/0711:10 PM
First Id like to thank you for those pictures. It was so selfless of you to post those but it was so sad I cried. My poor 'Nervous Nellie' is not looking so good herself. It may be when she cuddles with me she gets hot but it seems that her nose turns dark red/purple. She has also just had joeys and has been so stressed (again she gets terrified/ stressed very easily) she rubbed all the fur off her nose Im really very sorry if it doesent belong in this post but I need help.
Aww nice work Dancing! Listen, thanks for posting this and to all who have contributed. Is there any way to make this a sticky? B/c I really think the info would be great to be added to continually and be easily available as if something was wrong with my suggie I might want to reference it! I know posting the pics was hard, but it really DOES help! I only have one suggie and it's hard without ever having any previous and not having another one to compare it to, to know what something serious really looks like. Upon looking at the pics and reading the personal commentaries I know now I will be able to tell when something's wrong - AND not question the severity of the situation! It is easy to "wait til morning" but after reading these posts I know the first sign of something wrong will get a vet check, day or night!!
SO my question is this - supposing I already have a good exotics vet - what can they do in these situations?? It would be nice to know like OK my suggie has been sleeping a lot more, so what is the vet going to do? What's a good thing to suggest? Does that sort of thing maybe need a stool test? Or blood work? I am far from knowing what to do in regards to the illness symptoms and it would be nice to have recommendations of questions to ask or (importantly) behaviors to notice about your suggie that can help the vet. Last time they ate? Weights at every hour since symptoms showed up? Etc... And you hear stories of sick suggies that turn sad only to have comments AFTER like "oh when that happened they did this test and found this". Does this make sense?
Re: Body Language of a Sick glider
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#243546 03/25/0705:11 PM03/25/0705:11 PM
That makes sense, but I'm afraid I can't give you much help...maybe someone with more experience will come along soon and answer your questions.
I'm new to GC and considering comitting to a pair of gliders in the future. Glider illnesses are intriguing to me, and I really appreciate this thread! Thanks so much, Jen, for posting pictures of the poor little guy before he passed over the rainbow bridge. That was very selfless of you.
Re: Body Language of a Sick glider
[Re: Xfilefan]
#247362 03/29/0704:34 PM03/29/0704:34 PM
I would like to thank everyone for all the great posts. Being new to gliders I have found that the book that I read when I first got my gliders did not even come close to the things I should know..I have been going through reading everything here on GC and have learned so much of what can go wrong..I have been lucky so far my gliders are all healthy..I did have brindie to the vet because she wasn't cleaning herself down below and her stool was runny. She is okay now, I had changed her diet and when I put her back on the BML she was used to everything cleared up. I am so glad that my daughter found this website.
Re: Body Language of a Sick glider
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#264064 04/17/0705:27 PM04/17/0705:27 PM
At Jen's request, I'm going to lock this thread now since it's already a "sticky" at the top of the forum anyway. If anyone has any "body language" pictures or information that they would like to add to this thread, please send me a PM...
8/05/08 Edited to add:
Originally Posted By: Mayetze
Excessive barking from cage mates is sometimes an indicator of "Hey Mom/Dad come over here and check on whats going on."
Just in my experience, but it has saved a couple of my babies.