Gordita—a 2- to 3-year-old, ~500-g, female bearded dragon—presented to our 24-hour clinic as an emergency. She had been vomiting brown fluid for the past 2 days and was now lethargic and not eating. While changing residences, the owner had been keeping Gordita outside of her cage, on a table.

Abdominal palpation revealed a firm, freely movable density within the patient’s left cranial abdomen. Radiographs showed a round, metallic density in the stomach (FIGURE 1) . The presumed diagnosis was a gastrointestinal foreign body—probably a coin.

The patient was premedicated with intramuscular buprenorphine, an intravenous catheter was placed in the tail vein, and anesthesia was induced via mask induction with isoflurane. Anesthesia was maintained using isoflurane via an 8-French, red-rubber catheter, which was used as an endotracheal tube. The abdomen was explored surgically  (FIGURE 2; FIGURE 3), and the object was removed by gastrotomy. To our surprise, there was not just one coin, but four! Somehow, Gordita had ingested four pennies that formed a perfect stack in her stomach (FIGURE 4) .

After surgery, Gordita recovered very well, and the sutures were removed 8 weeks later. We hope that the owner learned not to let Gordita keep the change!