Sulcata Chipped/Lifting Scute

[DozerOwner]

About two years ago our tort had a small chip/crack on a scute. It was likely because his burrow was in the worst possible place where he dug under a concrete footer for a block fence. He would sometimes bang into the concrete footer when he was excavating. The small crack and chip slowly started grew into a larger and larger chip over the years as the layer lifted and flaked off. He's healthy, no problems, but I'm wondering if I should do something to stave off more flaking. I saw a video where a vet basically used something akin to auto body bondo to repair a shell that was literally fractured from a bad injury, not a a flaking scute. I wasn't sure if I should patch it with some type of filler safe/suitable for a tort shell or just leave it be and let it keep chipping off over the years.

Picture attached.

 

[Maro2Bear]

Greetings & Welcome to the Forum. I see that this is your very first post! Great. There’s an entire section on Tortoise Species, even African Tortoises, to include Sulcatas of course. We have a few resident “experts“ here, including @Tom and @Yvonne G and a few others who have been raising & taking care of Sulcatas for a very long time.

Just wondering, how often do you soak your tort? Given you are in Phoenix with high heat, low humidity, routine soaks would be of great benefit.

I can understand your question & interest in gluing that scute down so it doesnt get caught & get ripped off. On the other hand, that scute (like a bruised finger nail) is most probably dead.

im sure Tom or Yvonne or @Markw84 or our vet @zovick will pop in with some advice.

Good luck

➡️➡️ https://www.tortoiseforum.org/forums/sulcata-tortoises.88/

 

[DozerOwner]

We soaked him when he was small enough to handle. He's close to 100lbs now and will tear out of a play pool pretty quickly. When the property is floor irrigated every couple weeks sometimes he will wade through it and drink the standing water, but usually he almost always refuses to drink water when offered and doesn't want soaked. He has almost an acre of grass he mows (with some weeds we leave behind for him), and gets a head or two of a green leaf a few times per week. His burrow was over 20 feet long last measure. Estimated around 8 to 10 feet deep but it is hard to know for sure. It stays quite moist down there due to the regular irrigation, but we are going to have to backfill it and get him a new burrow going this winter because the gophers have introduced tunnels that allow the water to get into the burrow during irrigation and it's eroding his entrance back and compromising the burrow and opening up a safety issue on the property. Fun stuff trying to get a tort to start a burrow in a spot they dont want to be at. I have tried starting a new burrow from in the past by hand digging out an entrance and fencing off his old burrow but he will just dig under and around anything to get back to it.

 

[Maro2Bear]

You might want to actually build one of @Tom ’s “nightboxes” and get your Sully to use a nice dark, warm safe nightbox. There are lots of threads here on “nightboxes” and their construction & use. Much safer.

Regarding soaking. You could build/construct a shallow water wading area that is available for your Sully. Doesnt have to be deep, or elaborate, but helps in soaking.

 

[zovick]

About two years ago our tort had a small chip/crack on a scute. It was likely because his burrow was in the worst possible place where he dug under a concrete footer for a block fence. He would sometimes bang into the concrete footer when he was excavating. The small crack and chip slowly started grew into a larger and larger chip over the years as the layer lifted and flaked off. He's healthy, no problems, but I'm wondering if I should do something to stave off more flaking. I saw a video where a vet basically used something akin to auto body bondo to repair a shell that was literally fractured from a bad injury, not a a flaking scute. I wasn't sure if I should patch it with some type of filler safe/suitable for a tort shell or just leave it be and let it keep chipping off over the years.

Picture attached.

As I see it, the fractured edge of this scute should be "feathered" down to prevent it from catching on any obstructions and also to expose fresh and more healthy scute material. This could readily be done with a rotary instrument such as a straight low speed dental handpiece or a Dremel tool using a rather fine abrasive wheel. I believe doing this might also stop the scute from continuing to lift and actually stimulate regrowth of healthy keratin. It may need to be done several times at intervals of a few months or so to achieve a healthy scute again, but I think it is possible. A vet could do this if you are not inclined to try it yourself.

 

[DozerOwner]

I think I will give that a go first. A vet told us that was an option when it first appeared but they said as long as it wasn't getting goop inside of the cracked area that caused bacteria or mold to be harbored it probably wasn't a big deal and it would just weather away.

 

[zovick]

I think I will give that a go first. A vet told us that was an option when it first appeared but they said as long as it wasn't getting goop inside of the cracked area that caused bacteria or mold to be harbored it probably wasn't a big deal and it would just weather away.

Just do it at a fairly low speed and stop intermittently to prevent the wheel from generating too much heat which could damage the underlying bone. Or you can have another party spray water on the area to cool it as you use the grinding wheel.

I am a dentist and deal with situations similar to this fairly often when people chip their teeth for one reason or another.

 

[Tom]

Does this tortoise have a heat lamp or ceramic heating element somewhere?

 

[DozerOwner]

No heat. He's basically a free range tort on our property with a very large burrow he shelters in year round.