This morning I fed the torties and then started to get myself ready for the day. While I was brushing my teeth Chris yelled for me to come look at Mr.T and said he was acting strangely. He was rocking back and forth like he was trying to scratch his shell on the side of the hide. Then he started rubbing his face with his leg, and took off running like he was trying to escape something. Turns out he had a green aphid crawling on him, and when we looked carefully at the substrate, they were in there too.
We took everything out (after a quick trip to the LPS to get a new bag of substrate), scrubbed it all down and washed the torties. We rebuilt the habitat and put some fresh food in (this took up the whole morning). The babies were happily munching away, but Chris looked in and spotted another green aphid scooting across the sandstone.
I thought the bugs had come from the new hibiscus plant we bought 3 days ago, but they were actually on the kale we'd bought at Whole Foods in Chandler yesterday. That stuff is supposed to be for human consumption and all the leaves are covered with live aphids underneath!
And it only gets better... we put some pebbles in to fill the gaps in the sandstone (when it's filled with substrate they drag it around the food area) and Gunny ate one. It was round-ish and about 7mm, I saw him eat it, but I couldn't get it out of his mouth in time. I immediately called our vet (and we took all the pebbles out of course) and he told us to watch him carefully for any changes in appetite or excrement that could indicate he's not going to pass the pebble. Fingers crossed he'll be okay.
Lessons of the day 1) inspect your food very carefully no matter where you get it 2) remove anything inedible your tort could swallow in their enclosure, Even if they've never eaten it before, they can still decide to be stupid sometimes and eat rocks.
-Devon
We took everything out (after a quick trip to the LPS to get a new bag of substrate), scrubbed it all down and washed the torties. We rebuilt the habitat and put some fresh food in (this took up the whole morning). The babies were happily munching away, but Chris looked in and spotted another green aphid scooting across the sandstone.
I thought the bugs had come from the new hibiscus plant we bought 3 days ago, but they were actually on the kale we'd bought at Whole Foods in Chandler yesterday. That stuff is supposed to be for human consumption and all the leaves are covered with live aphids underneath!
And it only gets better... we put some pebbles in to fill the gaps in the sandstone (when it's filled with substrate they drag it around the food area) and Gunny ate one. It was round-ish and about 7mm, I saw him eat it, but I couldn't get it out of his mouth in time. I immediately called our vet (and we took all the pebbles out of course) and he told us to watch him carefully for any changes in appetite or excrement that could indicate he's not going to pass the pebble. Fingers crossed he'll be okay.
Lessons of the day 1) inspect your food very carefully no matter where you get it 2) remove anything inedible your tort could swallow in their enclosure, Even if they've never eaten it before, they can still decide to be stupid sometimes and eat rocks.
-Devon
