Eyesight Baby - Adult

[GregUnd]

Does eye sight in sulcata tortoise's improve as they get older? Another thread struck my curiosity, but the thread wasn't directly aimed at this topic. The reason I ask is because my baby sulcata seems to act like he can't see very well, running into things all the time and cant see things that are about to poke him in his face, what I mean is as he's walking he'll step on a piece of cypress that has a "shovel" effect.... meaning if you step the metal part of a shovel, it's going to hit you in the face. He also has to take a very close look at his food and when he goes to bite it, he tends to miss his target often. He bit himself in the leg the other day......

 

[Tom]

Mine show perfect eyesight and depth perception from the time they hatch. I don't know how their eyes are structured from an anatomical sense, but all of mine seem to see very well.


Was your baby ever under one of those coil type florescent UV bulbs?

 

[John]

How long has this been going on? In my experience with my leopards the next phase will be swelling of the brow followed by a reluctance to eat,soon after one or both eyes will not open anymore. In other words this behaviour can be the earliest sign of eye infection.

 

[GregUnd]

I had someone else on here mention to me that his eyes looked a little swollen. When I get back home I'll take a picture and post it. They haven't gotten and larger since he's been home.

 

[Maggie Cummings]

Are you using one of those coil lights? If so get rid of it as it causes eye damage. Get Terramycin eye ointment and apply it 3 times a day and if he does not have serious eye damage the ointment will help...

 

[John]

What are you using for substrate? Maggie is right Terramycin is what I used.

 

[GregUnd]

I'm using the PowerSun 100w Merc Vapor bulb with cypress substrate in his "living quaters" and I have his hideaway heated to 83 degrees with damp sphangum moss. Here's some pictures of his eyes, I think he's ok, but I just wanted to check. For pictures and information of his enclosure go here:

http://www.tortoiseforum.org/Thread-Using-Latex-Enamel-for-tortoise-enclosure#axzz1LKbPIeob

Could it possibly be that the poor lil' guy is just......... stupid?

 

[John]

I'm using the PowerSun 100w Merc Vapor bulb with cypress substrate in his "living quaters" and I have his hideaway heated to 83 degrees with damp sphangum moss. Here's some pictures of his eyes, I think he's ok, but I just wanted to check. For pictures and information of his enclosure go here:

http://www.tortoiseforum.org/Thread-Using-Latex-Enamel-for-tortoise-enclosure#axzz1LKbPIeob

Could it possibly be that the poor lil' guy is just......... stupid?

LOL, could be. I can't view thumbnail pics so can't see the eyes, maybe someone who can will be along and be able to give you an opinion. If you look straight down at his head do his brows stick out?

 

[Jacob]

My Little One Has Great Eye-sight!

 

[John]

Just to clarify one of my torts behaved as you describe then the other things I mentioned started to happen, It took a long time to cure him but he no longer acts blind.

 

[GregUnd]

I'm using the PowerSun 100w Merc Vapor bulb with cypress substrate in his "living quaters" and I have his hideaway heated to 83 degrees with damp sphangum moss. Here's some pictures of his eyes, I think he's ok, but I just wanted to check. For pictures and information of his enclosure go here:

http://www.tortoiseforum.org/Thread-Using-Latex-Enamel-for-tortoise-enclosure#axzz1LKbPIeob

Could it possibly be that the poor lil' guy is just......... stupid?

LOL, could be. I can't view thumbnail pics so can't see the eyes, maybe someone who can will be along and be able to give you an opinion. If you look straight down at his head do his brows stick out?

Yes but how much?

I'll post more pics in just a sec

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Here are the others

 

[John]

I would give the Terramycin a shot you can get it on the internet no script try reptile supply or lllreptile. I'm not a vet, and as I said Ican't see the pics the way you post. have you tried using tinypic.com?

 

[GregUnd]

---

He/She is such a beauty..... I got it from Tyler Stewart, I'd have a hard time imagining that it had abnormal eyes without him noticing, but by no means am I a tortoise expert. I do know for sure that he's gotten progressivly better as the days go by(He's only been home for 8 days now). But he's getting his pattern down, he knows when I come home I take him out and soak him, then he gets his food after he gets out of his soak. It was funny, today I put him in his bath, then I set him on the counter to take pics of his eyes, he immediately looks for his food... can't find it, take a few steps forword, looks down.... still nothing, takes a few more steps and looks side to side, puts his nose all the way down, and then finally looks up like.... dude... what the hell, where's my food.... Cracked me up.

He seems to have the hardest time with dark colors. His walls in his enclosure are black, his substrate is brown(cypress), and his mazuri is brown, he runs into his walls, pokes himself in the face with his substrate, and misses his mazuri about 30% of the time when he goes for a bite. However, when eating greens he has no problem. When outside he can move around green grass, but the dead grass, which is brown, he acts like he can't see. Also, he acts like he might not have depth preception. I don't know if he's just young and hasn't learned yet or what. I'm worried but at the same time I he shows signs of being able to see fine so I don't know what to think. Will this medicine hurt if he's not sick? If not I'll order it and administer it anyway, I don't care if something cost $1k, I'll do whatever it takes to make sure my lil' guy is taken care of.

Thanks again for your help.... it's much appriciated, I promise.

 

[John]

Well first off I know Tyler produces quality animals, second not all things can be controlled by the breeder when you deal in living things stuff happens beyond your control. Do you know the hatch date of this animal? Is that cypress mulch mixed with coco coir? If so did the coco come in a bag from petco? Its hard to tell from pics but there may be slight swelling there. I'm not a vet, just passing along my experience with my torts, I would just keep a close eye on him for now if you see his brows change,as in start to swell I would have a vet check him out There can be several causes of eye problems and if it takes to long to figure out which one he may have it will be longer to correct.

 

[GregUnd]

Hatch date is roughly 3/20/2011, and that is 100% cypress substrate.

 

[Mao Senpai]

You can test to see if he has eyesight issues. Just take a q-tip and put it near his eye and see if he reacts. Obviously don't poke him in the eye but you get the idea. Then try a different color pen or something just to see if it changes at all. If he reacts fine then he just acting dumb or not caring what hits him in the face

 

[GregUnd]

So the q-tip test failed, but I suspected it's just because he's pretty comfortable with me. I can rub his head and legs without him getting scared, which was one indication that his vision was probably fine. You would think if he had bad vision it would startle him when I touched him. Now fast movements will still startle the little guy but that's expected(I think).

So what I did is I let him roam around on the living room floor, which is carpet. I then took different color thread and balled it up into small balls and placed them throughout, when he came across the different colored thread he would stop and inspected it. He was also able to see a potential hiding spots from across the room.

Thankfully, I'm satisfied that he is able to see just fine