Cracked lower beak

[MPRC]

I have a fiesty 2 year old redfoots who likes to bite things...she will bite rocks, fences, bowls, food slates, people, cats, dirt clods, etc.

She has had a hairline split in her bottom beak for months that has been very solid. I was looking at it today and it seems to be fully broken now and flexes under pressure.

Can anyone advise what they might do in this situation?

I have several years of veterinary experience and I am not squeamish about working on my old animals - or about assisting my vet (she has reptile experience, but isn't a tortoise expert)

Would you leave it? Trim it? Have surgical intervention?

It has not effected her ability to eat to this point, but I fear that it may not wear down properly now that it is flexing and that the crack may not grow out as she literally tries to rip chunks out of her terracotta saucers. (As I type this she is crunching a snail)

Thank you

 

[Yvonne G]

You're correct in assuming that the new growth will continue to crack as long as it flexes. Try to figure out a way to stabilize it.

 

[tortdad]

Do they make a medical grade epoxy? I would assume they would

 

[Eric Phillips]

Do they make a medical grade epoxy? I would assume they would

I agree with tortdad, what about a surgical glue?

 

[MPRC]

My initial thought was dermabond (surgical super glue) but I'm hoping to her from someone who has been through this before I try. I have no experience using it on anything other than mammals.

 

[noora]

I have the same exact problem with my redfoot!! A cracked lower beak and im not sure what to do - Any suggestions?

 

[TammyJ]

Looks like she needs a tortoise dentist to make a kind of prosthetic metal/hard plastic lower beak replacement plate of some kind for her. Could secure it with the glue you mentioned. Maybe??? Just thinking.

 

[Tanuki]

I have a fiesty 2 year old redfoots who likes to bite things...she will bite rocks, fences, bowls, food slates, people, cats, dirt clods, etc.

She has had a hairline split in her bottom beak for months that has been very solid. I was looking at it today and it seems to be fully broken now and flexes under pressure.

Can anyone advise what they might do in this situation?

I have several years of veterinary experience and I am not squeamish about working on my old animals - or about assisting my vet (she has reptile experience, but isn't a tortoise expert)

Would you leave it? Trim it? Have surgical intervention?

It has not effected her ability to eat to this point, but I fear that it may not wear down properly now that it is flexing and that the crack may not grow out as she literally tries to rip chunks out of her terracotta saucers. (As I type this she is crunching a snail)

Thank you

View attachment 206974

Hello. Did you figure out a way to stabilize the beak? My tortoise has the same thing now and I am in the same boat, thinking day and night how to fix the crack, how to immobilize the tortoise while doing it, etc. Please help me with advice and experience. My phone is 720-891-6090. Thank you.

 

[zovick]

Hello. Did you figure out a way to stabilize the beak? My tortoise has the same thing now and I am in the same boat, thinking day and night how to fix the crack, how to immobilize the tortoise while doing it, etc. Please help me with advice and experience. My phone is 720-891-6090. Thank you.

You could take your tortoise to Dr. Steven Divers at the Exotics Department at UGA Vet School in Athens and he could probably repair it for you. In my experience, I have seen fractured beaks wired together to keep them from flexing until they healed. Maybe there is a newer technique with a Super Glue type material that would also do the trick, but I am not sure.

If you don't want to go to Athens, you could try Dr. Brad Wilson at The Veterinary Clinic West in Marietta. He is very good and knows tortoises. Justin Oguni is another vet there who has experience with tortoises. They both work at the Old Dallas Rd. location. Here is a link:

Our Professionals | Marietta, Ga | The Veterinary Clinic

Our veterinarians have a passion for all of their patients. And are highly trained and skilled in veterinary medicine.

www.theveterinaryclinic.net

If you go to either of the above places, please tell them I referred you to them.

 

[Tanuki]

You could take your tortoise to Dr. Steven Divers at the Exotics Department at UGA Vet School in Athens and he could probably repair it for you. In my experience, I have seen fractured beaks wired together to keep them from flexing until they healed. Maybe there is a newer technique with a Super Glue type material that would also do the trick, but I am not sure.

If you don't want to go to Athens, you could try Dr. Brad Wilson at The Veterinary Clinic West in Marietta. He is very good and knows tortoises. Justin Oguni is another vet there who has experience with tortoises. They both work at the Old Dallas Rd. location. Here is a link:

Our Professionals | Marietta, Ga | The Veterinary Clinic

Our veterinarians have a passion for all of their patients. And are highly trained and skilled in veterinary medicine.

www.theveterinaryclinic.net

If you go to either of the above places, please tell them I referred you to them.

You could take your tortoise to Dr. Steven Divers at the Exotics Department at UGA Vet School in Athens and he could probably repair it for you. In my experience, I have seen fractured beaks wired together to keep them from flexing until they healed. Maybe there is a newer technique with a Super Glue type material that would also do the trick, but I am not sure.

If you don't want to go to Athens, you could try Dr. Brad Wilson at The Veterinary Clinic West in Marietta. He is very good and knows tortoises. Justin Oguni is another vet there who has experience with tortoises. They both work at the Old Dallas Rd. location. Here is a link:

Our Professionals | Marietta, Ga | The Veterinary Clinic

Our veterinarians have a passion for all of their patients. And are highly trained and skilled in veterinary medicine.

www.theveterinaryclinic.net

If you go to either of the above places, please tell them I referred you to them.

Thanks a lot! What is your name, so that I tell the doc who referred me.

 

[zovick]

Thanks a lot! What is your name, so that I tell the doc who referred me.

No problem. Where are you going to take your tortoise? My name is Dr. William Zovickian. I live in Dacula, GA.

 

[Tanuki]

No problem. Where are you going to take your tortoise? My name is Dr. William Zovickian. I live in Dacula, GA.

No problem. Where are you going to take your tortoise? My name is Dr. William Zovickian. I live in Dacula, GA.

Hi Dr. Zovickian. Thank you again for the referrals that you provided. I am currently talking to Dr. Wilson about the repair. He said he could try and repair it under anesthesia with some mesh and epoxy. He also mentioned that this type of fractures are very hard to stabilize and success is not guaranteed. I haven’t contacted Dr. Divers at UGA yet. So are you a veterinarian? Have you ever done repairs like this? I am a pediatric dentist and I have all the materials for that kind of repair. I have a great new material called Ribbond, which is a bondable reinforcement ribbon that offers unsurpassed fracture toughnesss. I had great clinical success with it. I could use it on a tortoise with some flowable composite material. I just don’t know how to use it on a moving animal. If there was only a way to sedate it or immobilize it temporarily so that I could do the repair myself.

 

[Yvonne G]

Cut the food into bite sized pieces so the tortoise doesn't have to 'bite'. Also, don't allow grazing.

 

[zovick]

Hi Dr. Zovickian. Thank you again for the referrals that you provided. I am currently talking to Dr. Wilson about the repair. He said he could try and repair it under anesthesia with some mesh and epoxy. He also mentioned that this type of fractures are very hard to stabilize and success is not guaranteed. I haven’t contacted Dr. Divers at UGA yet. So are you a veterinarian? Have you ever done repairs like this? I am a pediatric dentist and I have all the materials for that kind of repair. I have a great new material called Ribbond, which is a bondable reinforcement ribbon that offers unsurpassed fracture toughnesss. I had great clinical success with it. I could use it on a tortoise with some flowable composite material. I just don’t know how to use it on a moving animal. If there was only a way to sedate it or immobilize it temporarily so that I could do the repair myself.

Believe it or not, I am a general dentist. I graduated from the Baltimore College of Dental Surgery of the University of Maryland in 1971.

I have not done repairs like this on tortoises, but I did a large amount of human oral surgery in the service during Viet Nam (even though I am not a specialist that is the treatment which was needed the most where I was stationed, and I was therefore assigned to do oral surgery on the strength of my dental school's oral surgery program for undergraduates) and wired several broken jaws to stabilize them for healing and a few others after elective orthognathic procedures also.

The repair method you described sounds great. You would need to immobilize your tortoise to have success, though. I have used a drug called Telazol to immobilize tortoises a few times. You could look into that and see if Dr. Wilson would give you some of it or even administer it in his office and let you do the repair while he observed. He might want to learn the process so he could do it himself in the future. You never know unless you ask.......

Good luck.