Help (swollen)

[cccccj]

My sulcata walks a bit strange,a bit swollen.can't walk normally,

 

[Tom]

Hello and welcome.

Is there a question there? If you want us to help you figure out why your tortoise is walking strangely, we will need more info.

Where in CA are you? Different advice for Yreka vs.Chula Vista.

How and where is the tortoise housed? Outdoors, indoors, night box, burrow, etc?

What do you feed the tortoise?

How often do you soak the tortoise?

 

[cccccj]

Hello and welcome.

Is there a question there? If you want us to help you figure out why your tortoise is walking strangely, we will need more info.

Where in CA are you? Different advice for Yreka vs.Chula Vista.

How and where is the tortoise housed? Outdoors, indoors, night box, burrow, etc?

What do you feed the tortoise?

How often do you soak the tortoise?

I live in Bay Area,and they indoors, and I usually feed it lettuce, dandelion, and bittercress. I soak it every two days.

 

[Yvonne G]

The walking problem may be due to poor diet causing calcium deficiency, but this is only a guess. We don't have enough info to give a good answer.

 

[cccccj]

The walking problem may be due to poor diet causing calcium deficiency, but this is only a guess. We don't have enough info to give a good answer.

i will feed Mazuri twice a week.

 

[cccccj]

He has only one leg that cannot move, everything else is normal. eats a lot every day.

 

[Tom]

I live in Bay Area,and they indoors, and I usually feed it lettuce, dandelion, and bittercress. I soak it every two days.

This info helps.

You said they. Is there more than one?

What size is the enclosure?
What substrate?
What are your four temperatures? Warm side, cool side, basking area, and overnight low?

Please read this, and look for the sulcata care sheet near the bottom for help with improving the diet:

Info For New People. Please Read This First.

Hello and welcome to tortoiseforum.org! We are all glad you are here! There is no other forum like this anywhere. We have tens of thousands of members from all over the world ranging from kids with their first tortoise to people who have been breeding and keeping high end tortoises since the...

tortoiseforum.org

 

[cccccj]

This info helps.

You said they. Is there more than one?

What size is the enclosure?
What substrate?
What are your four temperatures? Warm side, cool side, basking area, and overnight low?

Please read this, and look for the sulcata care sheet near the bottom for help with improving the diet:

Info For New People. Please Read This First.

Hello and welcome to tortoiseforum.org! We are all glad you are here! There is no other forum like this anywhere. We have tens of thousands of members from all over the world ranging from kids with their first tortoise to people who have been breeding and keeping high end tortoises since the...

tortoiseforum.org

Because it's very hot here, I don't use heating in the summer. I use a forest floor. The enclosure is approximately over 1 meter in size, and my tortoise is around 36cm.

 

[wellington]

Right off the bat, with the little choppy info you have given, she needs a bigger enclosure ASAP! One inside and outside would be best.
Also a much bigger variety of a diet.
Give a complete run down of the lights used for UV and basking?
Post pic of the enclosure and a full pic of the tort.
Do you have more than one tort? Do they live together?
All the questions asked throughout this thread needs to be answered.

 

[TammyJ]

Hi and welcome! Really, your information needs to be more detailed. Take some time to tell us how the tortoise is kept, please, as well as posting some more pictures of the whole animal and its enclosure. Thanks!

 

[cccccj]

Right off the bat, with the little choppy info you have given, she needs a bigger enclosure ASAP! One inside and outside would be best.
Also a much bigger variety of a diet.
Give a complete run down of the lights used for UV and basking?
Post pic of the enclosure and a full pic of the tort.
Do you have more than one tort? Do they live together?
All the questions asked throughout this thread needs to be answered.

They dont live together, for the summer i dont used UV and Basking, they run a around the balcony. i have other tortoise, but they not live in the same enclosure.

 

[Tom]

Because it's very hot here, I don't use heating in the summer. I use a forest floor. The enclosure is approximately over 1 meter in size, and my tortoise is around 36cm.

1 meter by what? If it is 1 meter wide and 10 meters long, that would be adequate. If its 1 meter square (100cm x 100cm) and you are housing a 36cm tortoise in this, it is way too small, and this is your problem.

Also, this species comes from Subsaharan Africa. The Bay Area on its hottest day of the year is no where near warm enough, especially at night. This tortoise should be living outside full time in a large outdoor enclosure (10 x 10 meters, or something close to that) with a well insulated, heated night box for every night, and cooler days. It can bask in the warm sunshine during warmer days, but will need that heated box for most of every year where you are.

This is a grass eating species. They need a high fiber diet with lots of grass in it. You can grow real grass, or you can use soaked horse hay cubes or pellets to add fiber and grass to the diet, but it also needs much more variety.

Your leg problem is probably one of two main possibilities, and each would be caused by the incorrect housing, diet, and temperatures.
1. Constipation. Sulcatas need a high fiber diet, warm temperatures day and night, and lots of room to exercise and walk around in their enclosures. Without all of these things, constipation is likely. Constipation will often cause them to drag their back legs, not use their back legs, or hold one back leg up.
2. Bladder stone. An x-ray can confirm or deny this one. Again, incorrect diet, cold temps, and small enclosures can sometimes cause them to retain urates which will eventually form a large "stone" and cause the symptoms that you are seeing.

If you want this tortoise to live, please read the link that I left for you in post number 7.

 

[cccccj]

1 meter by what? If it is 1 meter wide and 10 meters long, that would be adequate. If its 1 meter square (100cm x 100cm) and you are housing a 36cm tortoise in this, it is way too small, and this is your problem.

Also, this species comes from Subsaharan Africa. The Bay Area on its hottest day of the year is no where near warm enough, especially at night. This tortoise should be living outside full time in a large outdoor enclosure (10 x 10 meters, or something close to that) with a well insulated, heated night box for every night, and cooler days. It can bask in the warm sunshine during warmer days, but will need that heated box for most of every year where you are.

This is a grass eating species. They need a high fiber diet with lots of grass in it. You can grow real grass, or you can use soaked horse hay cubes or pellets to add fiber and grass to the diet, but it also needs much more variety.

Your leg problem is probably one of two main possibilities, and each would be caused by the incorrect housing, diet, and temperatures.
1. Constipation. Sulcatas need a high fiber diet, warm temperatures day and night, and lots of room to exercise and walk around in their enclosures. Without all of these things, constipation is likely. Constipation will often cause them to drag their back legs, not use their back legs, or hold one back leg up.
2. Bladder stone. An x-ray can confirm or deny this one. Again, incorrect diet, cold temps, and small enclosures can sometimes cause them to retain urates which will eventually form a large "stone" and cause the symptoms that you are seeing.

If you want this tortoise to live, please read the link that I left for you in post number 7.

Thank you for your reply. I will go and change the outdoor enclosure when I get off work tonight. However, he has urates and bowel movements every week, and I have been observing for so long without any abnormalities."

 

[TammyJ]

You have got the very best possible advice for the survival and better health of your tortoise. I so very much hope you really will follow it, and that you will realise you have nothing to lose by doing so, and you and your tortoise have everything to gain!

 

[wellington]

Imagine living in your bathroom. Not very comfortable is it? Little small and crowded. Boring and cramped, not being able to walk far without hitting a wall. Barely being able to exercise your muscles. Well that's the poor tortoises life being in such a small enclosure that is only big enough for a hatchling.
I had to rescue a leopard kept like that. He couldn't walk right either. Lots of hydrotherapy one him and proper room and food and after a couple years, he caught up to the size he was suppose to be for his age and can walk normal.