Sudden Increase In Urates

[Pokeymeg]

So I know that urates are fairly normal, but I am a bit concerned about Dante's urates. He's never really had urates since we got him (almost a year ago, he is 9 years old) and now he has a LOT. Not sure if I should be worried or not!

Now some of you may remember he had health issues last year. Long story short, he had a couple de-wormings and a long treatment of antibiotics for an unknown infection.

He actually just finished the antibiotics a couple weeks ago (he re-lapsed so he got a 2nd longer treatment), and seemingly around the same time his poop has been riddled with urates. It seems too coincidental. Mostly lots of tiny urates, sometimes larges ones.

He's been eating more since the end of his treatment (I suspect it was suppressing his appetite). He's been eating mostly Spring mix/baby lettuce mix/raddicchio/mazuri. I've been letting him eat whatever he wants (mostly the sweet baby lettuce mix and Mazuri) because he is fairly underweight and I'm more concerned with him putting on OZs rather than a totally balanced diet.

Any ideas? Is this an after-effect of antibiotics? Dante's poor GI tract has been through a lot in the last few months Is this something to even worry about?

Thanks for reading

 

[Tim/Robin]

Urates are perfectly normal for many species of tortoises. You only need to be concerned if they are hard or gritty. They should be thick & smooth like tooth paste!

 

[CtTortoiseMom]

Is their spinach in your spring mix? If so, Maybe take it out for awhile. Has he been drinking like normal?

 

[Pokeymeg]

No Spinach! Well, maybe a leaf here and there, but I take 90% of it out, and that's not new - He ate all of these things before his illness! The urates are in fact gritty, not very smooth. What do gritty urates mean?

Oh and yes, he does drink water. He also gets 3-4 soaks a week, at least 15-20 minutes.

 

[CtTortoiseMom]

My sully has urates once, maybe every month or so but it is milky and thick no bumps or grit at all. I don't know if gritty is bad. Can you post a pic?

 

[Pokeymeg]

Sure!

The first pic is from a couple weeks ago when this first started - This is a big one! But none of them have been nearly this big since, thankfully. Please ignore the food, Dante likes to poop where he eats (ew).

This is from tonight:

 

[Laura]

tonights looks like poop with urate with it.. normal. but the poop looks a bit soft and mucousy.. Have you ever had a fecal test done to check for parasites?

 

[CtTortoiseMom]

The unrates look normal to me. I just have no idea why they would suddenly be happening with more frequency.

 

[Pokeymeg]

tonights looks like poop with urate with it.. normal. but the poop looks a bit soft and mucousy.. Have you ever had a fecal test done to check for parasites?

Well I had a fecal test a few months ago for worms (which led to 2 rounds of de-worming). Would a vet tech notice parasites too, if they're looking for worms?

Thank you CtTortoisemom, I'm glad they look normal to you! To me they look pretty gritty, but I have very little experience with urates, so I'm happy to have another opinion. To me, I'm mostly concerned about the sudden increase - It makes me think something has changed and I'd like to know if it's good/bad!