I have a Russian tortoise recovering from MBD. She scraped off part of her shell trying to dig under a log, the very upper layer. I am looking for suggestions as to how to treat this. Would silvadene be the correct approach and where would I go to get some? Any advice is appreciated.

Maybe a picture would help? I'm not very experienced but everyone usually asks for pictures

Hi Pete:

Tortoises' shells are pretty hard and tough to damage. Even dog's scraping teeth have a hard time knocking off layers. I would have to assume the damage was there and you just never noticed it before. Steppe tortoises come into this country in pretty bad shape. They are all nicked and scraped and suffer from shell rot.

Now if your steppe tortoise is captive born, then I'm all wet. Is this a fairly young tortoise with a softer, more vulnerable shell?

Normally scraped shells are just minor and don't require any attention. Treat it as you would a minor scraped knee on one of your kids.

Yeah, sorry but I don't have pic taking abilities and only have computer access occasionally. Basically the outer layer of tan and black were scraped off.

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Emysemys, thanks. I wondered if the previous MBD made the outer layer of chitin weak. I was worried if this would become a vector for introducing other diseases, but someone said they do this in the wild scraping against rocks, so I thought he might be ok. I was wondering if I should treat it with iodine and something else to promote chitin growth, but I'll just keep it clean.

Hi Pete:

No, I wouldn't treat it with iodine or Betadine. Those products inhibit new white cell growth. Just keep it clean. If you can see the bone, the white that is under the keratin, then, that part of the bone dies and new keratin grows underneath it. Eventually, maybe a year or more, that dead bone raises up because of the new growth underneath, and will flake off.

I recently took in a male steppe tortoise who's whole carapace had been scraped free of the keratin layer:



Notice the dark lines towards the right front and towards the left front? Those are actually splits because what is growing under the dead bone is bigger than the dead bone. I believe that was back in April. Yesterday I noticed that quite a bit of that old dead bone has flaked off. Next time I can find him, I'll take some more pictures to show you. (Its not easy to find them in the overgrown pen)

I was finally able to find the little male steppe tortoise. Notice the two front vertebral and the two front marginals on the left side of the picture (the tortoise's right side). The old dead bone has flaked off and new keratin is now showing.



Its not as pretty a shell as it would be if it had not been damaged, but I'm thinking as that new keratin ages and gets polished and rubbed it will look smoother and cleaner.