Ants attacked my 1 yo leopard

I would post this on tort health but I don't have permissions. We let our 5 yo and 1 yo leopards go outside in a movable enclosure for a bit on the nice warm days to eat grass/weeds and get sun. Being in the southeast our torts seem to love it.

When I came out to get them the 1 yo had maybe 10 fire ants on her face and front arms and she had her eyes closed and was pretty closed up (note that we don't put them near any mounds and haven't had an issue before). The larger tort was fine.

I blew away the ants and rinsed her with water, then soaked her. She hasn't moved since and it has been a few hours.

Is there anything else I can do and/or does anyone have experience for how/if they recover and over what time?

We are pretty bummed since she seemed to be growing really good through the winter and we're looking forward to more outside time this summer. She was about to have a great summer.


Thank you ahead of time for your help.

She is probably really stressed out. Keep her somewhere warm and quiet and try not to mess with her too much. I would also be concerned for the safety of the other tortoise if I were you. Hopefully someone else comes along with more advice. I don't have to deal with fire ants here in OR.

ChucktownTort said:

I would post this on tort health but I don't have permissions. We let our 5 yo and 1 yo leopards go outside in a movable enclosure for a bit on the nice warm days to eat grass/weeds and get sun. Being in the southeast our torts seem to love it.

When I came out to get them the 1 yo had maybe 10 fire ants on her face and front arms and she had her eyes closed and was pretty closed up (note that we don't put them near any mounds and haven't had an issue before). The larger tort was fine.

I blew away the ants and rinsed her with water, then soaked her. She hasn't moved since and it has been a few hours.

Is there anything else I can do and/or does anyone have experience for how/if they recover and over what time?

We are pretty bummed since she seemed to be growing really good through the winter and we're looking forward to more outside time this summer. She was about to have a great summer.


Thank you ahead of time for your help.

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It probably still hurts. I would just leave her be, and she should recover in a few days. Soak her every single day for a few weeks. I've been through this too, and mine was fine.

Tom said:

It probably still hurts. I would just leave her be, and she should recover in a few days. Soak her every single day for a few weeks. I've been through this too, and mine was fine.

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Thanks Tom. Really good hearing from folks cause we were so worried. Do you think she will spend a day or two with her eyes closed? Basically, when should I expect some movement?

This is our second leopard and we have been doing a much better job (or so we feel) this time around, and this caught us completely off guard.

ChucktownTort said:

Thanks Tom. Really good hearing from folks cause we were so worried. Do you think she will spend a day or two with her eyes closed? Basically, when should I expect some movement?

This is our second leopard and we have been doing a much better job (or so we feel) this time around, and this caught us completely off guard.

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No way to tell. Just depends on how much venom she took on and where.

It hurts like hell to get stung by one of those ants. Imagine 10 of them in your face! Ouch!

Wow, so sorry, poor thing. I'm not sure if this will work on fire ants, but check and see. The food grade Diatomaceous earth.

wellington said:

Wow, so sorry, poor thing. I'm not sure if this will work on fire ants, but check and see. The food grade Diatomaceous earth.

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Sorry it came out so big. I had to copy and paste and that's how it came out. Wasn't trying to scream it LOL
Make sure it's the food/human grade/safe

wellington said:

Sorry it came out so big. I had to copy and paste and that's how it came out. Wasn't trying to scream it LOL
Make sure it's the food/human grade/safe

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Yeah we actually have a very large bag of DE for our chickens and did this about a month ago for the fire ants. Need to re-apply. Thanks.

Little torts take the ant bites seriously, one bit and they will walk around on three legs for weeks. They do get over it, now you know to be aware.

Thank you everyone for your help. We took it to the turtle vet today and he confirmed that it had died. We are heartbroken. It happened so quickly. It was such a good healthy tortoise and was doing so well.

So sorry.
I was bit by a fire ant once and I don't know if I had a more extreme reaction(was on vacation and we don't have them here) but I had almost nerve pain through the affected side of my body for a long time. Ten ants and who knows how many bites... I can see that being fatal on a little critter.

So sorry for your loss.

To all,

I know we already let folks know, but we lost our baby (confirmed by leading turtle dvm the Monday after the Saturday attack). Our 4 yo is still good but we are definitely bummed. I wanted to thank everyone for the quick responses and support.

I know how you feel, and sympathize. I lost a couple baby box turtles to fire ants (not recently). I also rescued a full grown male desert tortoise who had unknowingly stopped in his marching right on a big path of red ants. I was walking by and saw him doing some serious shaking and jumping, and discovered the ants swarming him. I put him in water and actually had to tweezer the ants off him because they had their mouthparts stuck in his skin. He was covered. But, he didn't die. I guess it's a lot harder for the little ones to recover from this.

I got my shop vac and vacuumed up the trail of ants, then followed it to where they were going. Then after vacuuming up as many as I could find, I dug a little trench around the mound and filled it with poison, then I enlarged the hole and sprayed Raid down into the hole. This was outside the tortoise yard, but if it were inside, I would have done the same thing, only covered it with an inverted flower pot with a heavy rock on top so the tortoises couldn't get to the poison.

So sorry about your little one.

Where is the member that was telling people that they don't need to worry about a few little ants? They should read this thread.

Very sorry for your loss ChucktownTort. It would appear that your fire ants carry a more potent punch than the species of ants we have here.

I treat the areas of my yard that I know my tortoises do not use. I know that you can't do that in your situation. I can't use D/E because of our high frequency of rain.
But there is one trick that I CAN share and that's this: I use glass jars with holes drilled in the metal lids hidden inside and around my pens with ant bait/poison inside. It will attract any ants that got through my defense barriers and they will share the poison with their friends. The jars are all but waterproof. Invisible, since they can be placed under or inside of anything and it's 100% safe for the animals.
I had a big issue with fire ants and I can now say that my yard is fire ant free. (ish)

ZEROPILOT said:

I treat the areas of my yard that I know my tortoises do not use. I know that you can't do that in your situation. I can't use D/E because of our high frequency of rain.
But there is one trick that I CAN share and that's this: I use glass jars with holes drilled in the metal lids hidden inside and around my pens with ant bait/poison inside. It will attract any ants that got through my defense barriers and they will share the poison with their friends. The jars are all but waterproof. Invisible, since they can be placed under or inside of anything and it's 100% safe for the animals.
I had a big issue with fire ants and I can now say that my yard is fire ant free. (ish)

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What bait do you use?

Out here I've had great success using Amdro Ant Granules. I use it differently than the label, but it works very well for me to keep my enclosures free of the big red ants and the little bitty stinging red ants that many Californians mistake for the fire ants that live in the South.

Tom said:

What bait do you use?

Out here I've had great success using Amdro Ant Granules. I use it differently than the label, but it works very well for me to keep my enclosures free of the big red ants and the little bitty stinging red ants that many Californians mistake for the fire ants that live in the South.

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I think it's by ORTHO.
Whatever is on sale at Home Depot. Right now there is bait in there.
I had DE dusted in my attic crawlspace. It looks like a Winter wonderland. Except for it being 155 degrees up there. My exterminator found ants and roaches up there years ago.,