Plesae Help! Sick Aldabra Tortoise

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Weda737

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Sooo glad to read that last post Badger, I was nearly holding my breath from post one, I just read through the whole thing. I hope things only get better. I have number 5. for your lessons learned, Never stop learning!
 

dmmj

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Good to hear, glad to see improvement.
 

Badger

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Thank you thank you everyone!

Goldie continues to do well (more poo!). He is still a little tired, but otherwise back to his normal happy self. Appetite have returned, almost back to true Aldabra style!
 

wellington

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FANTASTIC:D. So glad things are moving along:D. Hope he continues doing good. Thank you for all the updates and progress. You have been very helpful yourself, letting everyone go through this experience with you and learning by your unfortunate ordeal. Hoping for you and Goldie only more good progress :D
 

cljohnson

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So happy to hear Goldie is doing better.
I've been holding my breath following your thread.
I commend you for your diligence with the care of your tortoise and keeping all of us updated with your progress.
Posting cute pics and funny stories is a lot of fun but working through a serious problem like this I believe is the real porpoise of this forum.
We all learn from each other.
Best of luck.
 

Badger

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Hi everyone,

Hopefully, this will be the last update for this nerve wrecking saga. Happy to report that Goldie has made a full recovery. He is back to his usual happy self, eating lots and lots and very alert.

It is now day 5 since we got him to pass droppings and his poo still contain lots of Aspen and as such we are continuing with the twice a day soaking regime. Not taking any chances, we are also giving shelly daily soaks as well, just to help her "clear the system". There are no aspen in sight in their enclosure, and hay appears just as satisfying bedding for them as the potentially lethal counterpart. No more aspen ever!

In any case, I would love to post periodic updates on the pair going forward! Until next time!

Adam
 

dmmj

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Good to hear, lets hope that all future updates are good ones.
 

wellington

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Fantastic :D. You did a great job. Always like updates, especially ones just because they are doing great.
 

tweeter

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Gotta love these happy endings! Of course I think new pictures are in order :)
 

Badger

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lushcious said:
Yay for a wonderful recovery! Keep us updated with pics ;)

Thanks for the continuing support everyone!

Well the saga continues, it has been 2.5 weeks seems Goldie's recovery and we thought that he was all back to normal...that was until last night.

After the visit to the exotic pet hospital and the advice we got, rearranged some of the husbandry conditions as recommended.

1) Out the Aspen (Never want to see you again!)
2) Daily soaks.

So far so good, but the below is somewhat more contraversial.
1) The coir is also gone. At the advice from the pet (who did really seem to know a lot about tortoises), he mentioned that coir is not good and can also lead to impaction if ingested.
2) I should replace it with newspaper. I was actually a little surprised, sorry, very surprised. I read that newspapers as a substrate is close to evil, no moisture, no thermal use, basically, save for being cheap, is pretty useless. As a comprimise, I lay news paper on 2/3 of the enclosure at the bottom (to soak pee and poo) and one top of it, I lay a nice layer of timonthy, bermuda, orhid hay for the to burrow and walk on. The rest 1/3 is a ceramic tiles area that they bask under the UV. I figure as evil as newspaper is, if it prevents impaction and that the hay provides them with a nice area to walk and sleep on, that is fine.

To compensate for humidity, I let my fog machine run during the day in the basking area so they get to enjoy a continuous spa during the day and as mentioned daily soaks.

So far, everyone seems to be enjoying and I do love the smell of hay in morning.

Anyway, back to Goldie. Since last night, he basically has lost his appetitte (again). That would be 2 meals he has missed. I am not sure what is the reason but I speculate:

1) On Tuesday, I bought a new brand of Country Garden Herbs, for the fact that in Hong Kong, we dont have access to a lot of wild flowers, weeds etc. It is comprised of dandelion, plantain, chicory, mint, milk thistle, marigold, cornflower, jeusalem artichoke is a dried form. The ingredient seems quite reasonable, in fact I am growing my own dandelions and marigold currently so I can feed them fresh ones!
2) On Tuesday night, Goldie picked his bowl clean. 100%. So far so good.
3) Wednesday night, didnt touch his food.
4) Thursday night, didnt touch his food, except the mazuri.
5) Oh, and yeah, in the spirit of mixing things up, I mixed in orchard grass (again from the vet) instead of Timonthy hay, you know, to keep things interesting.

So two nights, no food. Not panicking, but a bit worried. So I went out to buy some spring mix (that is gourmet food to them!) and again, mixed it with the dried garden herbs (the original types, not the new ones) and orchard grass. Little interest, I basically had to hand feed him. He did like the greens, but he was slow on the uptake, looking like his is being suspicious. I know his is hungry, because he will snap at my fingers (only does that when he is hungry) and the pace of eating is slow compared to normal.

So basically, apart from not eating, he looks a bit dazed and a bit tired. Contrary to last time, he poos fine. Strangely, Shelly has been fed the exact same stuff and she seems to have no problems (normally she is the picky one). Well, so tommorrow I can going to try a couple new things:

1) Replace the orchard with Timothy hay
2) Replace the garden herbs with the original ones that I have been feeding them.
3) Over the weekend, clean the table, and remove the newspaper.

I will let everyone know how it turns out. I guess not eating a few days is not a big deal, though it is definitely a big change in behavioral.

Oh, will post photos soon. We had a birthday party for Shelly a couple weeks ago, made her a cake (and a hat). Will post soon!

Thanks!

Badger
 

Laura

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sometimes they dont like change. so all the new enclosure changes can mix them up a bit.. newspaper and hay does not provide much traction.. harder to walk on.. can you lay a towel down?
 

Badger

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Laura said:
sometimes they dont like change. so all the new enclosure changes can mix them up a bit.. newspaper and hay does not provide much traction.. harder to walk on.. can you lay a towel down?

Well, I changed the enclosure settings 2 weeks ago and all throughout that time until yesterady they were doing good. Can this be a delayed reaction?

On any normal day, Goldie will eat anything you put in front of him, I am worried that he might try to eat the towel!!
 

ALDABRAMAN

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Badger said:
Thank you thank you everyone!

Goldie continues to do well (more poo!). He is still a little tired, but otherwise back to his normal happy self. Appetite have returned, almost back to true Aldabra style!

:)
 
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