BLUE TONGUE SKINKS

Hey everyone!

It has been so so long since I have been on here... it makes me sad. Life has been nuts the past couple of months, and I apologize for coming on here just to ask a question!

Over the past few weeks my skink has been making weird hacking noises. To me it sounds as if she were about to throw up, but she never does. She coughs or gags a couple of times (sounds awful), then goes back to normal. It happens so randomly and quickly that I haven't been able to get it recorded on my phone. I hear it happen about once a day, sometimes more, sometimes less or not every day. I haven't noticed a pattern with her eating and "hacking" or coughing, so I'm not sure that's the reason.

My first thought was respiratory infection, but I'm also unsure.
She is in a 48"x24"x12" PVC vive with a heat lamp on a dimmer and timer (12 hour intervals). Her daytime cool side temp ranges in the mid 70's (about 74-80F), night time it is no cooler than 72F. Her day time warm spot at it's highest is 98-100F. She is on aspen bedding, humidity about 30% right now. She is a very active skink and cruises her vive a lot, makes tunnels, sleeps out in the open often (I attribute that to her being comfortable), and scratches at the glass to come out ALL THE TIME.

What are your thoughts??

THANK YOU!

As I've never heard anything like that coming from my skinks I'm afraid I can't give you any other advice other than, if it continues and is worrying you, you should maybe see a vet. As BTS's do not have a diaphragm they aren't able to cough, but I'd imagine if they have a lot of mucous they would try to move it any way they can, i.e. through "huffing" it up and using their tongue, and the thing that causes mucous in reptiles tends to be respiratory infections, which can be very serious.

My little one was seen yesterday for a respiratory infection. Vet said anything audible is not normal for breathing. Please see a vet to be safe. My girl is puzzling to my vet. He has never seen any reptile with many problems in such a short amount of time. I've had her 6 weeks and by 3 weeks she was presenting odd issues that vet thinks were starting before I bought her. It is heartbreaking, but glad I have been pursuing anything that looks or sounds off because I have saved her life by now.