Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Well I got a new leopard a week ago he is about 2" long. I keep at my girlfriends house during the week and her mom watchs him for me. Well I came home tonight and noticed that around his mouth and tail were almost black. I also noticed that his eyes appear to be watery and that when held close to my ear he was making a "poping" or "clicking" sound. I'm going to take him to the vet tommrow but do you guys have any ideas what this could be? Perhaps an URI? Any help would be appreciated.

From your description, this sounds bad; and if a URI, it's not limited to just that.

See that vet asap;

Search for some husbandry information (www.chelonia.org is a good place I believe), and reassess how it is currently kept. If you're the only one "in the know", perhaps keep the tort at your place, or check on it more often during the week.

Ian

I think I may have over reacted. The coloring around his mouth was not black it was dark green which I hadn't noticed before was also his legs the greens he was eating must have stained his mouth. I also noticed that his eyes dont look very watery today so I think I may have also overreacted on that. He is eating and active. Now the only thing that worries me is that noise me makes but I have read that babies do make a noise like the one I have described. Not sure and I couldn't get ahold of the vet today.

Odds are the black/green stuff is crap... poop... feces... nasty stuff. These guys have a habit of doing that.

Make sure the temperatures do not go below 80 for the little guy. For the first couple of years they can be very delicate.

>>I think I may have over reacted. The coloring around his mouth was not black it was dark green which I hadn't noticed before was also his legs the greens he was eating must have stained his mouth. I also noticed that his eyes dont look very watery today so I think I may have also overreacted on that. He is eating and active. Now the only thing that worries me is that noise me makes but I have read that babies do make a noise like the one I have described. Not sure and I couldn't get ahold of the vet today.
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Ed @ Tortoise Keepers
Trying to keep the fun in Chelonian care

Wait your saying they eat there own feces? No wonder I can't find any in his tank! He does seem to have diahrea though what would be causing that? His diet right now is mix Mustard and Romaine greens with a rep-cal calcium/d3 mix sprinkeled onto it.

Concerning the diahrrea:

If I feed my leopards nothing but grocery greens, their feces become very loose and runny.

They need more fiber. With a high-fiber diet their stools become solid.

Try grass, timothy hay, and some of the pelleted foods like Mazuri or Pretty Pets tortoise chows.

Now don't throw down a pile of grass or hay for the next meal and then come back saying "See, he won't eat it."

Chop up the grass (or hay) very finely, and mix it into chopped greens. Maybe run both through a food processor at the same time. Don't give the tort a chance to reject it - if he wants to eat greens he'll have to eat some fiber. Maybe start with just a touch of fiber and mostly greens, and slowly work more and more fiber into the meal over time.

The pellets also make a convenient way to add even more fiber to the diet. Mazuri pellets, which have a high fiber content, get very mushy after being soaked a couple minutes, and it makes it easy to mix with chopped hay or grass. Form the mazuri/hay mix into balls and feed them to the tort.

If you can't get the Mazuri, I've found the Pretty Pets tortoise pllets to be very popular with my leopards. It doesn't mush up well, so it's harder to mix in with grass/hay. But it has much more fiber than greens.

Hope this helps.