Jay Bagley
Well-Known Member
I noticed there's been a lot of talk lately about mvb's. I did a little experiment of my own, I'm just merely sharing the results. I don't have enough experience with tortoises, tortoise lighting, anything tortoise related to have a debate with anybody. This is my first tortoise. That's not the purpose of my post, I'm just merely sharing my own personal results. A little background for anyone who is not up to speed with my tortoise Sheldon. We got Sheldon when he was roughly three months old. He stayed the next two and a half years of his life with my ex, and the last 9 months with me. Up until 2 weeks ago Saturday, he was kept in an open top tortoise table. Lighting and heat consisted of 100W CHE, and two 125W Exo Terra MVB's. The temps under the CHE were 85-90, MVB's one was 95° and the other 100° on average, temps fluctuated a little bit with the varying room temperature. Everywhere else in the enclosure was at room temperature, which most of the winter was around 73 to 74°. That said, the majority of his day was spent huddling underneath his MVB, and at night huddling underneath his CHE. When I got him back from my ex, he showed the obvious signs of pyramiding, and a very dry shell. Then I found you guys, learned all about closed chambers, and panicked because I knew I wasn't doing a whole lot of anything right. I didn't have the money at the time, or the know-how to build a closed chamber. I did the daily soakings, I misted his shell down a few times a day, I kept the substrate dry with the fear of not being able to keep the entire enclosure at a controlled 80 degrees or above. I also started using that stuff called Nature's Zone Shell Saver which is kind of a glorified coconut oil marketed four turtles and tortoises. It claimed that it would keep the shell moistened, and keep it from drying out. I was desperate, so I've used that product since November. I've applied it once a week, every week up until 2 weeks ago when I finally got Sheldon into a closed chamber. I'm not here to advocate this product, definitely not here to advocate MVB's, and I definitely do not want to entice new members to follow the shortcuts that I was forced to take. If I could have had a closed chamber built immediately after getting Sheldon back, that is the route I would have taken. I like the idea of natural humidity inside a closed chamber, versus rubbing something that smells like lotion all over him. Back to my little experiment that I was talking about, I applied it to his entire shell the entire time. Starting in mid-January I continue to apply it everywhere with the exception of the bottom half of his lower back scutes. I wanted to see if they would look any different being exposed dry all the time to a MVB, compared to the rest of the shell that was being artificially moistened. Here are the pictures of my results, the majority of the shell to me looks like it grew relatively smooth, and looks relatively healthy. The parts of the shell in the last few pictures that were not exposed to artificial moisture,(sum did get on it sumtimes, but not alot) and exposed to the same MVB appear super dry, have had consistent peeling, and I believe they we're experiencing the desiccating effect you guys talk about. So I can only imagine what a MVB would have done to his entire shell. Just soaking, and spraying the shell down alone without anything else, I think his shell would be in very rough shape right now from his MVB. Anyways, I had just joked with somebody the other day about writing a 2000 word essay, and now I just wrote one. Once again, I'm not trying to prove anything, advocate anyting, just sharing my own personal results. If you made it all the way through, thank you for reading.
