Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I am hoping I am just overreacting but thought i would ask. Latley(as in the last 2 days)my tortise has been acting weird. During the day he is just laying in his cage and not really moving much. When you pick him up he is not as responsive as usual. I think it might be the heat because it has been much warmer the last few days and i have read that that when it gets to warm sulcata's get unresponsive until the temp drops. That is what i am hoping but i am still worried. He is on a mostly sand bedding right now. I have been feeding him reptomin soft gel/lettuce and various greens,occasional fruit treat with some vitamin suppliment sprinkeld in. The last few days his cage has been getting up to 90F. I checked and he has no visible signs anywhere on him of any problems. Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Reptomin softgel (according to the website) is designed for fruit eating reptiles. It has apples, melon something, and beef liver!

This does not look like a good diet for for a sulcata at all.
It has only 4% fiber, and the rest of the diet you listed as lettuce, greens and fruit, has very little fiber at all. A sulcata needs lots of fiber or else it'll have problems with its digestive tract. Do the feces look solid or runny?

I'm no sulcata expert, but they need grasses, hay and other high fiber items along with some greens. And your sulcata probably needs to have a spot cooler than 90 so it can cool off a little.

The poor diet mixed with the constant heat may have left the tortoise dehydrated and weak. Soak it in shallow water (about an inch) for 10 minutes every day for now, try to create a cooler spot in its enclosure so it can get a break from the heat, and work on a better diet. See if it'll eat some yard grass, dandelions, clover, etc (no chemicals!) mixed in with some greens. No more fruit or gel at least until it recovers. Make sure it gets calcium and some exposure to sunlight and/or a d3 supplement. I think there's a website called sulcata station that people go to for info.

Also check out www.tortoisetrust.org and www.tortoise.org for more info.

Good luck and let us know how it works out! And if the tort continues to do poorly, go to a herp-qualified vet!!!

Stool is solid. And we just turned on the air this evening to cool down the entire house and in effect his cage. I will try a change in the diet. The four books I got didn't really mention the emphasis on grass,but I checked out the website you mentioned "sulcata station" and that is what they recommemded too. I started the soaking today already. From what sulcata station had on thier website it sounds like dehdration. Thanks for replying.

Best of luck.

Speaking of heat: It's best to supply your tortoise with a range of temperatures so that he can choose a comfortable spot.

What I do with my russians and leopards when they are indoors is put their enclosure in an area where the temperatures make an acceptable cool zone (say 65-80 day and night) and use heat lamps to create hot spots of about 95 for 12 hours a day. The tortoises spend their days shuffling in and out of the hot spots in one corner of the enclosure and over to the cooler areas.

When my animals are outdoors, I provide them with a shady area or hidebox that allows them to get out of the sun and cool off.