Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I recently purchased an adult pair of WC yellow foot torts. (Don't say anything about the WC please)

The male is doing great! Eating, drinking, etc. He weighed 9.6 lbs arriving and is now at 12 lbs.

The female is not doing so good. She has refused ALL food, water. She has not defecated until the vet did an enema. :0 Even then it was dehydrated urine. We have been trying to treat for parasites, but we can't get her mouth open, so have been dripping it in the corner of her mouth. The vet won't tube feed and I can't force her mouth open and have NO ONE to help me. She is very dehydrated and is losing weight everyday.

She is soaked every day in warm water. (Not hot!) and is misted daily with a very humid, warm enclosure. On her good days (when she is active) I will take her outside to sit in the sun for hours at a time. She will stroll until she finds somewhere to hide. I DON'T KNOW WHAT ELSE TO DO!! ANY IDEAS???? Thanks everyone.

Brittani

You NEED to find a different vet!!!! Both of them need to be treated for parasites. The female NEEDS to be tubed. Your vet is an idiot. Find a new vet ASAP or you are going to lose your tortoise.

Where do you live?

Hey,

Yes my vet is an odd one, BUT he is the only semi-experinced vet (That I know of) with in a 4 hour drive. I managed to convince a couple of the vets to get together and tube feed my female.

I made a mixture of Pedialyte, mushed up fruit, small amount of Hand feeding formula for birds (because of the vitamins, nutrients, etc.) and a small amount of Panacur and Flagyl.

She seems to be doing ok this am. (Not good, but not dying from stress). I figure I could wait a few days and if she hasn't started eating, then try again.

I am in SW CO. Know anyone who could help? Thanks.

Brittani

Hi, her condition sounds similar to what happened to a few of my sulcata tortoises. The best thing to do is to do a procedure where the vet inserts a tube through the neck into the stomach. The tube will stay there until the tortoise regains all her weight back. As long as the tortoises enclosure is somewhat clean it will not get infected. It might look like it hurts the turtle by coming out of the neck but they don't even notice it. You should do this soon otherwise stress is going to kick in with your tortoise. good luck