Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I found a large male box turtle today while working at one of my thesis sites. I was concerned about the appearance of bulges on either side of his head, resembling a ear abscess. I was also surprised by the "frosted" appearance of his eyes. It definitely did not look like cataracts, instead it resembled the cloudiness of a snake eye when it is going to shed. Although this turtle did not seem especially afraid of us, it headed straight for the water when we released it where I observed some unusual behavior. It partially submerged in the water and held its head under, with one of its back legs sticking out. There it sat for almost five minutes. I didn't quite understand this behavior, but he did he eventually come out and start looking around before heading back upland. My question for the forum is, are the bulges on the sides of its head an ear abscess, and is it related to the milky condition of the eyes? Both of these conditions can be easily seen in the picture included. The turtle was released where we found it with a minimal disturbance.

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*Humans aren't the only species on earth... we just act like it.

".the oldest task in human history: to live on a piece of land without
spoiling it."
Aldo Leopold (1938)

From doing rehab on turtles, I've seen strange floating behaviors only in animals with some type of infection. Ear abscesses are a possibility and the cloudy eyes would come with an infection as well. If it is an abscess in the ears or mouth it has probably invaded the whole head and the animal will die without medical care. Was it emaciated at all? I've found that turtles won't eat or drink if they are ill.
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The bulges are ear abcesses. Depending on the severity of that infection, particularly if it progesses deep into the ear canals and through to the throat/mouth area it's possible that the depressed immune system has opened up to a likely bacterial infection of the eyes which would seem to mesh with that 'frosted' look appearance you speak of. It's also possible that if the internal pressure from the ear infections is great enough it can actually be pushing on the optic nerves of the eyes and could be accounting for the cloudy vision.

Typically in this case I'm banking on bacterial infection in the eye as that and ear abcesses are fairly common in box turtles recently come out of hibernation and often when there has been possible drought conditions during the previous summer/fall season. Lack of ambient water/humidity in the air/local enviornment (ie dry leaves/dirt/grass to hide under rather than semi-damp) and fewer water holes to keep themselves hydrated lead to the inability for the ear canals to drain properly leading to a buildup of bacteria that eventually erupt into an abcess.

I find that during drought seasons/years I see a high number of ear infections and eye infections and during wet seasons/years I see a lot of broken shell damage from cars hitting them. During droughts turtles tend to not wander as much and during wet seasons they are more on the prowl and likely to come into contact with roads/cars.

The turtle holding it's head underwater in that fashion, it was merely taking a very long extended drink and possibly soaking to help soften up the skin around the ear membranes. Soaking helps to get abcesses to erupt as the soften skin causes the pressure to lean more towards the ear membrane rather than into the canals and helps allow the membrane to burst easier.

A turtle recieved in this fashion I would normally put on a week long course of injectible antibiotics (probably 3 injections of the proper dose for the turtle's weight for q48), have a vet lance the abcesses and clean out the ear and canals, and use opthalmic eye ointments on the eyes. Sometimes if the infection is really deep in the canals you have to get what you can and then wait a few days more for the rest to come up to the surface now that the pressure has been relieved to an extent and then clean that out. After a month of care the ear membrane should be sufficiently healed over and the turtle generally fit for release.

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Wyvern

Thanks for the info from both of you. It was exactly as I suspected. I only have experience with abscesses in one turtle and I didn't want to assume the worst. He did not seem emaciated, he was actually quite alert but not fearful of being picked up, which is not entirely unusual.

Unfortunately I do not usually see the same box turtle twice, so my chances of coming across him again are very slim. I wouldn't have the capacity to treat this animal anyway, but in this case I consider it to be natural and that I'm sure box turtles died of ear abscesses long before humans showed up. This was at a created wetland, but is not subject to high human disturbance. Although it would be interesting to keep track of any further infections in box turtle's as an indicator of pollution or other stressors in the population. If I see it again I will let you know how it is doing.
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*Humans aren't the only species on earth... we just act like it.

".the oldest task in human history: to live on a piece of land without
spoiling it."
Aldo Leopold (1938)