Nose Bubbles

[roscoepcole]

Hi yes I have a 3 year old leopard tortoise I got her about a month ago, she's eating great and a lot.today, I noticed that she had some bubbles come out of her nose along with a little discharge. this is the first time I noticed it. The vet won't be in until Tuesday..any advise?

 

[Arizona Sulcata]

Keep her extra warm and monitor her daily to check for progress.

 

[Maggie Cummings]

She *might* be too dry, bubbles don't always mean URTI. Sometimes it means they are too dry or stressed or dusty. So up her temps some and make sure she's not in a draft and monitor her until Tuesday and try yourself to not get too stressed out over it. She's eating and acting normal, so that means it's not too serious. Also if you saw the bubbles while she was actually eating if her food was wet there's a very good chance that the bubbles were caused from chewing or mushing her food around. Their nares are connected right to their mouth so it actually could have been from the process of eating.

 

[Tim/Robin]

She *might* be too dry, bubbles don't always mean URTI. Sometimes it means they are too dry or stressed or dusty. So up her temps some and make sure she's not in a draft and monitor her until Tuesday and try yourself to not get too stressed out over it. She's eating and acting normal, so that means it's not too serious. Also if you saw the bubbles while she was actually eating if her food was wet there's a very good chance that the bubbles were caused from chewing or mushing her food around. Their nares are connected right to their mouth so it actually could have been from the process of eating.

Great reply Maggie!!!! I am 100% convinced that some tortoises just have bubbly noses at times. I have one that has been on every antibiotic invented and still occasionally has a bubbly nose. I finally have accepted this and know that he is OK. He has grown better than some of the others his size/age. His weight is good. He is as active as any. He simply has an occasional bubbly nose. I do know he does best if kept warm especially at night. So, keep your tortoise warm and monitor behavior. The other thing I always recommend is get an accurate weight. Weigh the tortoise at minimum every month and watch for trends. If the weight is trending down and activity levels have decreased some, then time to intervene and the first thing I do is 24 hr heat. With this though, realized you MUST increase soaks to daily. Increased heat without increasing soaks is a disaster in the making.

 

[roscoepcole]

Well I checked on her this morning and her nose was running but she ate tons of food I'm in Florida and the weather is around 80 low 70s at night but I bring her in at night to be sure