Hair loss above eye

Hi all. Poor T. Rex, he cannot seem to catch a break. He has a bald spot that he has developed overnight about the size of two or three grains of rice above his left eye, which had a deep corneal scratch several months ago. The eyelid was not scratched. This bald spot is pink with no scratches. It looks like over grooming to me. I'm going to take him to the vets tomorrow morning. He is also completing a course of metronidazole (flagyl) for giardia. He also rolled in HPW the other night fighting with his brother. He's still a bit crusty from that, but is better. Any suggestions? Also posting to glider central.net:thanks: 

Honestly I feel he is more then likely just stressed for all he is going though. I would not panic about this unless it gets worst. If you feel he needs a vet appointment by all mean then take him but you are more then likely just going to stress him out more.

You need to treat him for his other issue and not pester him all the time. We need our rest when we feel good and we need it more when we are not 100%.

I agree Brenda. That's a good point. He is also still kind of dirty and crusty from when he rolled in the hpw and looks horrible. I would be stressed too if Godzilla kept coming after me with medicine and a wet wash cloth! So unless it gets red, inflamed or an open scratch or wound I'll keep him home and limit times I disturb him. I am one that worries a lot and my first reaction is to go to the vets. Poor baby has been through so much... Thank you for your advice. Without these forums I wouldn't know what to do!

Agreed with Brenda. He is likely picking up on YOUR stress as well. Some people tend to worry and fret over their gliders more than others, and often times the end result is that their gliders are more anxious and stressed. You and your gliders should enjoy each other without all the stress. Relax and enjoy them!

Hope that your little one is getting some time to de-stress.

Do want to say, though, that if he is not grooming himself, that is a cause for concern.  A healthy, adult glider should not need any assistance in grooming himself, no matter what he may or may not have fallen into.  


This thread might have some great info or tips for you in regard to the overgrooming: https://thesweetspot.forumotion.net/t231-overgrooming?highlight=overgrooming

Hey Val, He's doing well and had a restful day :)

His fur is a bit clumped together on his back... He is grooming himself but the Hpw is the equivalent of sticky yogurt/honey mixture that dried on him. He gets cleaner every day, and is eating, peeing and pooping regularly. He's very independent and does not like having others groom him. I do worry about him, but he is mobile and moving. He just has a very different personality than the others and is also a habitual 'taster' of me. If you think I should text or post a pic, let me know. Thanks :)

Ps - Thank you for the link to overgrooming, it was very helpful!

Hey guys, he is still not clean. He grooms his head and paws and that's it. He is eating and drinking but is very picky as to what he eats (his choices would be peas, corn and chicken if I let him eat only that (which I don't!). I think he needs to go to the vet. I have a sneaking suspicion that he has some sort of mal-absorption or nutritional imbalance. He is also changing colors from a lion colored glider to a standard grey with an almost white back leg. He has lost a bit of weight and just doesn't look right. I will bring the whole colony to the vets so hopefully it will be less stressful for him. He was an owner abandon and is supposed to be a year and a half. I think he might be older. I don't know what the future holds for T Rex, but I will post some pictures to the Mystery Illness Section and then what my Vet says. Hopefully it will help another glider owner at some point in time if I can get down to the bottom of this. He is just not well :(

FYI -changing colors like that is a GOOD thing. It means that he is getting the crap out of his system and his true color is coming through. So, that is not anything to worry about.

Please don't start another thread about him. Get the tests done and post here any questions you have. Same glider, one thread. Good luck!

Update: I took T Rex to the vet and he has no intestinal flora, no parasites but diarrhea. They think maybe Knudsen's Mega Green juice caused the diarrhea. I mixed it with their HPW powder. It has bananas as one of the first ingredients. The vet has her colleague look at the slide and was baffled. Neither had seen anything like this and they are experienced sugar glider vets (Drs. David and Lusk at Westgate Pet and Bird in Austin). He is 108 grams and has not lost weight. He is not grooming himself. Dr. Davis prescribed Neo-Cal-Glucon for T Rex and his brother (they are 1.5 year old rescues and ate God-knows-what diet) and send his fecal out for further investigation (on the invoice it reads Fecal Direct, float, trichome to AEL). Dr. Davis recommended a probiotic and I am using Primal Defense (an ingredient in Val's Green Diet). Hopefully this info might help someone else experiencing a mystery ailment :( More to follow when I get the fecal back. T Rex will be relaxing and de-stressing until further notice :)

If you are using bee pollen in your staple then that COULD be what they are seeing. You may want to ask them abiut it.

I did tell them that. They saw weird rod Bacteria that they had never seen before.

So, they DID see bacteria, but not what they were expecting for gut flora?
It is not at all unusual for a glider who has been on antibiotics to have no or little gut flora, so that isn't so much a mystery. Any time a glider is on any medication, he/she should also be on a probiotic or two. Pre and probiotics both is even better. The Primal Defense will provide that.

The Mega green juice is perfectly safe and has been fed to gliders with much more involved issues than this for many years. Your gliders have a history that is very common. The only real issue here is to determine what specific bacteria you are looking at. Did they explain why not then do a culture?

Other than that, you are now aware that you have to replace gut flora when you are killing it off, so with the Primal Defense you are on your way. You could also use yogurt. Good luck!

They did see rod shaped bacteria but no normal gut flora. The strange thing is, I have given him yogurt or kefir (vet suggested this) while he was on the metronidazole and every day since, as I am huge into pre and probiotics for my own digestive health and know that during treatment with an antibiotic or anti parasitic normal gut flora is killed indiscriminately. Treatment with flagyl ended on 11/22, so the vet said there should be some good flora there by now (12/3). The fecal sample that was sent out will tell me more. They are going to figure out what those rod shaped bacteria are by sending out the sample. The vet mentioned if we can't get his gut flora normal (she thinks with the Primal Defense it will return to normal) we could do a "poop transplant" from another glider but she has never done it, nor does she want to. I concur. T Rex is eating and lapping up his Primal Defense enhanced HPW now. There is a female in heat in the next cage over and he seems quite active in his pursuit through the bars ;) Thanks for the words of advice everyone! Hopefully this is a quick fix ;)

Update- T Rex's fecal came back normal. He is slowly losing his old fur and regrowing grey and black fur (I thought he was a lion but he is turning into a beautiful standard grey ;)) He is still over grooming his eye, but is eating well. I don't know what happened to him in his past life, but I do my best to let him sleep every day and have as calm a playtime as we can have. I believe he went through something horrible in his previous life. So, I am hoping the over grooming will stop in time. I wanted to post an update to thank you all for your help. T. rex is a very special boy and I'm grateful to have him ;)

Glad to hear he is doing well. Every glider is different in their likes and dislikes. It takes time to understand a rescue/re-homed gliders quirks. In time they will be comfortable in their environment. Many people go way to fast trying to get to know the glider they bring home. They do not let them adjust and constantly fuss over them.