Hi all,

I'm ashamed to admit that I've been going through a lot in my personal life, I suffer from chronic depression and anxiety and I was not taking care of myself for a few months. Needless to say, my gliders' care was also affected. I have continued to feed them the Priscilla Price diet and I usually switch between ground turkey and hard boiled eggs for protein. I have been slacking on the supplement powder, though. I just ordered some new powder but they went maybe two weeks without it as a supplement. I also had been slacking on playtime and treats. I used to give them a handful of worms hidden in a foraging box every day, lots of yogis, and I used to take them out for playtime multiple times a week but for the past few months I have been neglecting that.

I noticed rust on their cage and this sort of shocked me into the realization that I'd been neglecting their care. I began cleaning the cage and realized it was in horrible condition, rust in many places, smelly, all around gross. So, I threw it out and bought a new one and cleaned all their toys and pouches, transfered everything to the new cage, bought a bunch of supplies etc.. basically I'm getting my sh*t together and pushing myself out of this depressive episode and I refuse to ever let myself get low enough to where I begin to neglect my girls again... I feel so guilty and horrible about it!

Anyway, the point of this post is because I am worried about Licorice. I have two girls, Licorice is the mother of Necco. Necco seems fine. Not much seems to bother her, she's an explorer, always curious, kind of a brat haha. I call Licorice my stay-at-home-mom because during play time when I let them out in my room, she always stays by the cage or close to the pouch. But Necco is immediately out and about, smelling every corner and getting lost in the clothes hamper! Licorice has two symmetrical bald spots above her eyes. I noticed the first one a few months back but didn't think much of it. Now that I'm spending more time with them I've noticed another spot above her other eye and her fur seems a bit cracked, just mildly unkempt. Today I noticed that the fur around her tummy pouch is darker and slightly greasy looking. As far as weight they have always been small even when I first got them. Not underweight but on the lower end. I believe around ~75g each last time they were weighed but the vet didn't seem concerned.

So my questions are: does this sound like over grooming? poor diet? should I increase their weight? I rarely ever miss a feeding, occasionally it has happened but they always have dry food available on the side. I'm going to increase their play time and start spending more time carrying them in a pouch, even when I'm just sad at home watching TV.

Part of the reason why I'm trying to kick-start myself out of this depression and start giving myself and my pets the right amount of care is because I just lost my job and it shook me up, I was living with blinders on, just working and coming home and sleeping. I've realized I was not taking care of many parts of my life. But this makes it hard because as we all know vets are expensive and I just lost my source of income. I will make a vet appointment though, and ask them about a payment plan. I'm 24, just out of college, I don't have much to fall back on. But I love these girls more than anything and if I can keep them healthy and happy maybe it will rub off on me! Haha.

Thanks for reading! Please advise! Much love!

some images for y'all to look at so you can see what I'm talking about, also her belly fur is sort of yellowing but I think that's normal for white gliders.
https://photos.app.goo.gl/oJLfeStfnNc9Hc1t9

Hello again and you have a beautiful little one!

She needs to go to the vet for a well check and have a swab culture done on her pouch.

Is she a single glider?

What diet is she on?

Her over grooming could be from anxiety or boredom. Does she have a safe wheel and toys?

Hi!!

I just made a vet appointment for Thursday afternoon.

I have two gliders! They are on the Priscilla Price diet but I've been slacking a bit because I ran out of supplement powder for the past few weeks. I just bought more and I won't let myself run out again!

She has lots of toys and a big Stealth Wheel from AttixWorx.

Awesome! To all the above! Just making sure.

Be sure to have them check her teeth.
(Sidenote: glider teeth don't grow like rats and rabbits. We have heard of vets trimming their teeth. Just a FYI) It should be part of their well check.

They should do a fecal too.

How long has she been over grooming? I'm sure it's kind of hard to tell with her coat color.

Is her mate doing OK?

Also have them check for parasites and Giardia, and a UTI.

Another issue that I've seen between tpg and greasy fur is that people were using dark meat chicken. Dark meat is very greasy and even one batch of tpg made with dark meat can cause their fur to becoming greasy from all the extra fat that's in dark meat.

I don't use TPG or recommend it, I never would have thought of that.

you don't reccomend TPG? that's all I've ever used! I've heard that TPG and HPW are the best.

I only use hard boiled eggs and ground turkey as my proteins. I'll switch between regular eggs and quail eggs but I've never used dark meat!

I noticed one bald spot a few months back but I never thought much of it, since her fur is light and grey on her head I couldn't really see it and for a while I thought it was just a cowlick or something. But I realized it was bald once I noticed the symmetrical spot above her other eye.

I'm the first to admit I'm not familiar with the TPG diet. I feed Critterlove which is similar to OHPW. The difference are the salads that are recommended to go with it.

I feel a vet visit will clear up a few things.

This is from Shelly and the Sugar Glider diet Study of 2014.



This is a big reason why I don't recommend TPG. I feed Critterlove, it has been tested and continues to be tested. The five fruit and vegetable 'salad' mixtures that you mix up and feed provide the gliders with a wide variety of fruits and vegetables.

I also recommend BML, I started out feeding BML but no longer feed it due to most of my gliders would not eat the staple portion of the diet. My gliders clean up most of their Complete and salad every night.

Wow, okay thank you!!! I will look into HPW, BML and Critterlove and see which one is most reasonable for me.

Okay I just got back from the vet and I was perscribed Nolvasan to dilute with water and clean her pouch daily for about two weeks. The vet did a culture swab and said there was a little bit of bacteria but not enough to be alarmed. Her weight, heart and lungs were all healthy. She's about 86 grams.

She also said that the bald spots were overgrooming that must be coming from my other glider, because the location is not a place she could overgroom herself. Do you guys think this is something that will improve if I just make sure to give them more attention and lots of entertainment? What are common stressors for gliders? Do you think just a dirty cage and boredom could have caused the overgrooming? I have been taking them out and playing with them for about an hour daily for almost a week now!

Thanks all for your advice!



edit: re: Priscilla Price diet - I do not just sprinkle the supplement on top, I thaw the mixture and then mix it with the supplement thoroughly. Do you think this makes a difference?

There are so many variables with TPG.

I have had rescues come in that were on TPG, they were all underweight and discolored. I put them on Critterlove and their fur darkens and goes from brown to grey.

Peggy will send you a sample of Critterlove, I believe all you do is pay shipping.

They may have gotten bored...

It may be time to find some new toys to explore ... Or change /rearrange everything in the cage.