I think one of my egyptians has a prolapsed penis!! I don't know what to do! He (I thought it was a she) usually sticks it out and back in usually. But this time he hasn't been able to get it back in. And he tries. What do I do???? Plz help!
emysemys said:Yes, sometimes an overload of parasites will cause the prolapse. Also straining or an infection...there isn't any one thing we can point you to, but I'd be willing to bet that its the parasite load that caused it.
I use the horse de-wormer, Panacur. You can buy the de-wormer (be sure to get Panacur or whatever brand has the drug "fenbendazole" in it) at a feed store. Panacur horse wormer is a 10% paste and this formula is only good for Panacur horse wormer with 10% fenbendazole - .5 ml per pound of body weight. So if your tortoise weighs a half pound, you would give him .25ml. You administer this orally.
DO NOT use any other drug. Not Ivermectin for sure or you'll kill your tortoise.
De-wormers are poison. Do not use them indiscriminately. You could kill your tortoise.
emysemys said:You won't necessarily see the worms in their feces. But if one has them, they all probably do. In fact, parasites are a normal fact of life for most animals. It only causes a problem when they get too many. For instance, if you have a herbivore and you start feeding him too much fruit, it might cause the parasites to over-populate the gut.
Some people only de-worm if they have a fecal test done and parasite eggs show up in the feces.
Others routinely de-worm twice a year, spring and fall.
Since you're seeing worms, that means that that particular tortoise has too many of them and he needs to be de-wormed. Your vet might want to de-worm all your tortoises. Probably a good idea.
emysemys said:If it were me, and my very young tortoises were eating and acting normal, I wouldn't de-worm them. The wormer is pretty hard on a tortoise's system. They sometimes act very depressed for a while after being de-wormed. No telling what it might do to very young tortoises.