Hm, my guy is pretty fat and happy besides the soft poops, so I'm not sure if crypto could be the culprit. I always assumed that was a very serious condition. I haven't really heard anything about crypto in tortoises, though.
I'm not sure if they went that in-depth into it but they identified some species and they all should be treated with metronidazole but it just wasn't working. There was one kind of rare amoeba that we used iodoquinol (sp?) to take care of, IIRC the iodoquinol worked for the amoeba specifically...
I moved away from that area and the herp vets near my current home aren't great, honestly. Apparently in other countries they sometimes use ronidazole and dimetridazole, but not in the US.
A different vet blindly prescribed Panacur at first and it did not help.
No, he is my only tortoise, the healthy poop before was sourced by the vet. I moved away from that area and can't bring him back to that vet, so I have no access to more healthy donor poop.
My redfoot has been struggling with protozoa for years now. It waxes and wanes, but mostly I keep it in check by not feeding fruit or other wet/sugary foods. I also give him some TNT with probiotics.
He's very active and he's at a good weight, but his poop is never normal. It's always soft (at...
Hello, I’m also in the Bay Area with my RF!
It looks like Mrs. Turtle might still be too small to definitively sex, so you may have “Mr. Turtle” back in a year or two. Thank you for giving her love and care when she needed it. :)
I use PowerSun as well, I strongly recommend it, but it does get quite hot.
For my tort’s last enclosure, I went from 2 regular heat bulbs to 1 PowerSun and the ambient temps were the same...though I was using a 160w.
Their bodies can not utilize the D3 in their diet/supplements without sunlight or an artificial source of UVB. Even if you fed D3 by the mouthful, which you shouldn’t, their shells would not harden. UVA is important too, but what your tortoises need is a UVB source.
Without UVB, the soft shell...
I am so glad the implant worked for Joe! Bean has been eating and drinking more now except for when he gets hormonal spikes in the morning and night. Also, for some reason, seeing food seems to trigger his hormones and he will start clucking and pacing (but not humping things) when I’m trying to...
@ZEROPILOT I actually...fixed the issue. And I’m filled with more questions than answers.
I gave Bean a bunch of different things to pick as a sex toy. He picked the plastic shell of a cat scratcher. He exclusively masturbated with it ever since. When he masturbates with it, he’s actually able...
I just googled that brand and it’s not available for pickup or delivery at any retailer, I remember there were some legal issues around the sale of cypress on the west coast and apparently it’s still going strong.
Believe me, I’m happy with just 65% humidity in California. :) The cypress is...
Oh I know they’re good for cleaning up decaying matter, I’m just deathly afraid of insects. I know it’s illogical but I can’t help it. The mulch itself also breaks down quickly and I end up with low humidity and tons of springtails.
I live in California so cypress can be quite expensive as...
It seems like a lot of people love orchid bark. I’ll try to get it wholesale somehow...I have a 5x7 ft enclosure to cover and he likes his substrate fairly deep.
Hopefully this puts an end to all this misery. In the future when his hormones hopefully settle down a little I’ll try coco again.
Coconut coir. Been using it a long time though, and he started masturbating a few years ago, so the coir wasn’t an issue until recently.
I had springtails with cypress and it lost its ability to retain moisture very quickly. Any bark substrate recommendations?
Bean’s been having an issue with his penis for months now.
I recently made a thread about how he doesn’t eat because he’s busy masturbating, and then I got into the “penis issue”. I thought I’d make a thread about it specifically because I’m desperate for help.
Bean is very active, healthy...
He has 2 water dishes that he can fully soak in, but he doesn’t think to when he’s got substrate stuck to his penis. I have to keep putting him back in the water dishes and he’ll keep climbing out, so I soak him instead. The penis is fully retracted. I don’t know if it is prolapsing in his...
Yep...thankfully he’s asymptomatic as long as he’s not on substrate. Quality of life isn’t great without substrate but I try to make do by giving him lots of rocks and plants to mess around with until this issue is sorted out. Anything to keep him happy. He’s my special little boy.
He is always in his enclosure except when I try to feed him, so roughly 10 minutes at a time outside of his enclosure, when he refuses food within that time he goes right back in.
This is a somewhat related issue...I do not have any substrate in his enclosure except in tubs he cannot reach (my...
Be prepared! I was expecting puberty to hit him like a baseball bat, not a freight train. You can never be too prepared for the chelonian sex apocalypse.
Spoke too soon. He just ate his weight in dandelion, squash and swiss chard. :D
He’s too full to be horny now. Just lounging around in his enclosure. It’ll be just like old times until the testosterone kicks in again.