Hi everyone, here because I'm worried my whites tree frog has a bad and very sudden case of red leg or something else. He (or she, not sure) stopped eating five days ago despite me only having him about 2 weeks now. His skin became discolored today as he brightened up from dark brown and is now very patchy.
His entire underbelly looks red too. I gave him a warm honey bath that got a lot of skin off. He was still hopping around so he still has good energy despite not eating. I'm still worried something is wrong though. I took out the coco fiber substrate, cleaned his enclosure (20 gallons) and put down paper towels, his water bowl, and two plants for him to hide and climb on for now.
I'm not sure if the branches from before are safe to put back yet. I've been keeping his temp at about 75-82 during the day and 70 at night but heard keeping it warmer may help and will increase temp.
Here are some photos. If anyone has any suggestions please share! Thank you.
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Looks like it might be a case of redleg. You said you got him 2 weeks ago so it might be a bit of stress. Keep his humidity high as possible for a few days and he might shed this skin. If you decide to go to the vet they might give it antibiotics like baytril. If he stops eating force feed him.
I recommend a vet. The honey bath might help his skin and give him a little more energy but red leg is fairly serious and can kill quickly.
That looks like a bacterial infection aka septicemia to me. A vet is your best bet at this point, but raising the temps to at least 85º will help. I would recommend higher since higher temps can help control and even kill invasive organisms, but his state may be too fragile, so I would only go up to 85º.
If his belly area is red, this is quite serious and you need to try and get him help as soon as you can. I hope you're able to help him.
Thank you for the kind responses and help, everyone. Unfortunately he passed away only a few hours after I posted this. It happened so suddenly I was unable to get him vet care but I'm aware of signs and symptoms now if they appear less rapidly in the future. It's been a tough time trying to get over it but I suspect he may have been sick when I got him do to poor eating habits at the start. I've learned a lot about prevention, treatment and acceptance in the past few days and I hope I can stop this from ever happening again. Thank you all again so much.
I'm so sorry to hear that. It can be difficult to spot the early signs of frog illness and sometimes by the time they start showing symptoms, it can be advanced.
Considering the short amount of time you had him, he likely came to you already sick or the stress of moving lowered his immune system and allowed bacteria to run rampant, so I wouldn't blame yourself by any means. I hope you have better luck with your next froggy friend.
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