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It spread through my colony like wildfire. So far I have taken 2 and plan on taken 5 more to the rehaber. This is the first time anything like this has happened. I never had so much as a swollen ear/head or shell rot. From learning from you all and the rehaber, I plan on avoiding this again. I have a few questions and would really appreciate your info.

1. Why can't Eastern box turtles fight off a respiratory infection without a vets care? How would the do it in the wild.

2. Can I take my turtle to the vet BEFORE it gets a respiratory infection? Will it be imune?
The rehaber said that the offspring will be imune.

3.I drained my pond. What else can I do to get rid of the bacteria?

There are just too many other factors that could have been the catalyst cause for the R.I. Almost impossible to say without knowing what you know about their living conditions. A better determination can be made from the vet after some lab culture or slides. You could have a viral pathogen, a bacterial condition, it could be mycoplasma, malnutrition, an environmental climate condition, toxic chemical poisoning in the pond.....etc, etc. An R.I. could be secondary to, or symptomatic of something else as well.

Does this rehabber have specific medical knowledge of the causative agent at work here that you're not including? It's pretty irresponsible to tell you that offspring will have some immunity to something if this person does not even know whether it is viral, or bacterial, or a toxic chemical contaminant, or what! That's just B.S.

Turtle's who get R.I.'s also have offspring that can get R.I.'s. It depends on the specific pathogen, environmental conditions, immune response, yada yada. If they're stressed, if they're malnurished, if their immune response is compromised, if their respiratory system is irritated...there are many reasons I can think of why offspring would get an R.I., regardless of whether the parents had it or not.

I would be worried enough that I would check into a toxic contaminant condition on your property, as well as disinfecting whatever living areas you can. Move the turtles you have off location if you can until you find the source, and, isolate them from one another as well.

Mick
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"When tyranny and oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign foe."

James Madison

Just for informational purposes, how many boxies are we talking about?

1) You have to separate ALL into their own enclosure if possible for at least 2 months. You have to stop this in its tracks NOW!
2) Sounds like your area is a "Hotbed". Close it down also for at 2 months & wash it down. I would just put a little dishwasher soap (mix it well w/water in a feeding spray jar connected to a hose & just spray everything down. I would do that about 3 or 4 times during the 2 months.
3) You must have to stop letting the boxies share the same watering hole.
4) Even though you separate them all, you may still have a few come down with it. It may be already in their system. But after a couple of months, you'll know which ones are healthy before you put them together again.
5) Never heard that the hatchling will be immuned to RI. No such animal.
6) Do not overcrowd them anymore - That's one reason why it spread like wildfire. I know you would like to have hundreds of them to watch - but it isn't practical. I also have them in sections. This way, if something should break out - it doesn't spread the way yours did.

For your info: I have been breeding Easterns, 3 toes & gulfies for a while & I am always careful about overcrowding them & handling them. I've raised quite a few hatchlings to adulthood & am working on & hope to get my "4th Generation" soon. BTW, I have never sold one hatchling yet & don't plan to. I don't have the scientific knowledge compared to others on this board, but do have a little insight on how to raise boxies. Chances are, I've raised boxies through experience and not by reading. There was no such thing as a PC when I started this hobby & not that many turtle breeders back then. Good Luck. Hope you don't lose anymore boxies.

How big is your turtle pen?
How many turtles are you housing? Have you separated the sick ones yet?
What are you using for a pond: is it in-ground/permanent or something more 'portable'?
Do you feed them all in the same area?
Starting by removing/disinfecting 'shared' items would be a good first step.
Stephanie

The pond I am using is vinly. It had a pump but it would get clogged from all the stuff the turtles drag in the water. So everyday after work I put the hose in the pond and over fill it until alot of the water spills out. I put at least 2-3 times the volume of the pond in it after work. The pen is maybe 20 x 20 or so. In this pen I am not sure exactly how many boxies are in it. there is so many logs,bushes,rockes etc. I never can see all of them. I don't count them . I never really did. I just feed them and nothing has gone wrong until now. I go out there with a cookie sheet with bannas,strawberries,blueberries,nightcrawlers, taomatoes and some water. All mixed with this vitiamen powder I bought lately. They all crwal up and eat together. Also they are rarly alone, when the bury themselves. They have enogh space. Do you think they gather because these are the best spots to burrow?

I was told to wash my pond vinyl in bleach. I plan on doing the same with the rocks.

There are wild turtles in my yard. All kinds. My enclose borders wilderness and I can find boxies and animals around my pen because of the berry bushes that grow from inside my pen. The drop berries outside. I have not seen one wild turtle this year out there which is odd. Is there a possibility of something in the wild boxie population that spread to mine? I may be reaching here.

It is possible something came in from the wild population. That's the primary reason for isolating new wild tenants.
There's no certainty though. I have heard strange reports lately of unknown pathogens going around in the wild that has affected other things. Texas Horned Lizards are currently being tested in the wild for some form of malaria which has reportedly afflicted them, and there have been reported hundreds of thousands of honey bee hive losses due to an unknown virus. If wild turtles freely intermix with your captive ones, then it is likely.

You can use a chlorine bleach & water solution. Use 9 parts water / 1 part bleach. Do not over strengthen the bleach. It doesn't have to be exact, but it will be harder to rinse off of the vinyl, and it is a better oxidizer when there is a higher ratio of water available. Let it sit for about 30 minutes.

You probably have some slime attached to the vinyl that a pond over fill won't get rid of. I would also consider all this overflow a problem if you don't have drainage for it. Overflowing the pond with 2 or 3 times it's volume everyday, without proper runoff, would set up a bacterial or fungal breeding ground. There's nothing like that going on is there? No swarms of disease and parasite ridden insects brought on by water runoff, and feeding on your turtles?

If needed you can use a soil sterilizer known as Dazomet ( Basamid G ) to disinfect and control microorganisms; such as bacteria and fungi, and pests such as nematodes, on the ground. the ground would have to sit unused for about a month though while it worked and the fumigant gases dissapated. You could get faster results from spraying with an iodine solution, but it would likely be more costly to use that much iodine. Bleach would not be a good choice on the soil.

Mick
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"When tyranny and oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign foe."

James Madison

A few points:

Have you taken any of your turtles to a vet yet for treatment, and/or separated the sick from the healthy? If not, what are you waiting for? You first posted about this problem a couple of weeks ago, but I'm not exactly clear on what steps you've actually taken so far.

You don't know how many box turtles you have, but you seem confident that you have enough room for them in a 20'x20' enclosure with an unfiltered water source. Back in May you stated that you had 13 Eastern box turtles: have you acquired more since then? And are they sharing this enclosure with the painteds, spotteds, musks and snappers you mentioned in that post?

I think you need to be honest with us: the quality of advice you will get from us directly correlates to the quality of information you give us. You'd implied that you'd already surrendered the sick ones, but now you reveal that, with the exception of 2, you haven't. Please show some respect by being honest: respect for us, for yourself and for your pets.

Having a pump for your pond is not enough to keep it clean: you need a filtration system. There is a pond & watergarden forum here on Kingsnake where you can go for advice on that subject. With proper filtration, your pond can be somewhat self-cleaning: as it stands now, your pond may well have a significant amount of turtle waste sitting on the bottom and breeding all sorts of things.

If that is what you feed your turtles regularly, then you need to tweek their diet: from what you describe, I would say that they are not being fed sufficient amounts of vegetables and leafy greens. Which means they may not be getting adequate quantities of beta-carotines and vit. A.

You should get yourself out there, locate all of your box turtles, COUNT THEM, look them over for signs of illness. Follow the instructions previously given for quarantine, feed them a more rounded diet, get them the care they need RIGHT AWAY, clean out that pond, invest in a filtration system that is adequate to the task.

Regards
Stephanie

It's not that am being dishonest. Just not clear because I don't type fast and skip alot of details. I have 9 box turtles they are all seperated in tubs like I was told to get.
I released all the stink pots,snappers and painted turtles a while ago before all of this happened. Most of the turtles where the size of a nickel or quater. some where adults. I have two ponds not in the same enclosure as they are for koi and smaller turtles.
I made two trips to the Townsend wild life rehab center and dropped off a total of 7 boxies I believe. I am not sure. I took the second group yesterday. I estimated 13 turtles. It was actully 19. I don't go around and dig them up for a head count. Maybe I am supposed to. I don't know. The only turtles that are new are spotted and have been here for a few months. They have not been affectd by the R.I.
My enclosure has alot of balck berry bushes and they have thorns. It makes it very hard to scour the ground for turtles. My brother and I also have an enclosure at his house. It has 2 ponds but not an abundant amount of plants.
I offer the turtles a night crawler. If they do not eat it, I take the to the rehaber. That is how I found out the first ones where ill. Then I saw bubbles. I never took the to the vet. You read "I did the right thing" so I don't understand why you think I would lie.
I am sorry if I not as good a keeper as you.yet. As I said, I have kept turtles for a long time. Doing wrong things like giveing them ground meat and such. I was 8 then and from them until now I have learned a little and plan on learning alot.

Please ask me to clearify a situation before calling me a liar.There is nothing worse than a liar. I am sure it is just a misunderstanding and will be glad to clearify it. Thank you for your advice.

This is the first time I did not explode when being approached this way. I think I just might be growing up.

Thanks for elaborating. I was trying to point out to you that you seem to have omitted alot of information in previous posts, and you have certainly made somewhat contradictory statements in the past. Good for you for not losing your temper.

In a situation like this I think that its very important to be as thorough and direct (yes, honest) as possible: that way you can get (hopefully) the best advice. You have a BIG problem on your hands, so please don't spare the details.
I'm not trying to hurl insults at you, or anything like that at all, but rather, I'm trying to extract as much information as possible from you, to better evaluate your situation.

That having been said, I'll try answering some of your questions.
In the wild, free-roaming turtles would probably not congregate, and remain, in small areas (the size of your enclosure, say) for any significant length of time, so diseases would probably not spread at such a rapid rate. Their water source would probably be flowing water or a pond with its own ecosystem/biological filter in place. Their waste would be dispersed, rather than concentrated in small areas.
I have not come across any literature about respiratory diseases in wild box turtle populations and how the wild animals cope should they become ill, but that does not mean that any such literature does not exist. They may simply crawl away and die. It has been stated that, overall, wild box turtle are relatively healthy, but then again, we only see the survivors.

About soil sterilization: there is a very simple technique used by gardeners that entails laying black sheet plastic out on the soil surface for a certain period of time: enough heat builds underneath to kill weed seeds and an assortment of pathogens. I don't know if it would work in your situation, but I'd certainly give it a try, since it is so low-tech.

As for your pond, scrubbing it out with a bleach solution will certainly work: from there you need to check out filtration options, and evaluate whether or not your pump is adequate for the size of your pond: a general guideline is that a pump should be powerful enough to run the capacity of your pond through it in an hour. In other words, if your pond holds 100 gallons of water, your pump should run 100 gallons per hour. Up to a point (you don't need a pump to shoot water across your backyard) stronger is better. Our pond holds about 100 gallons: our pump is a 250 gph pump.
There are alot of filtration system options out there, so you'll need to check out different options: see if there's anyone in your area who does ornamental ponds, or who has experience with koi ponds: koi require near perfect filtrations, so someone who has experience with them will know their stuff. Many aquatic plants are perennial, so you can leave them in the pond over the winter. Others are tropical/annual, but the good oxygenators are also inexpensive, so replacing them annually is not a wallet-buster. The plants are important for filtering water.

As far as keeping better track of your turtles is concerned, consider this: if you check them regularly, you can better monitor their overall condition, and be better equipped to nip a problem in the bud before it spreads. If you keep better track of them, and are more observant, you will become better at spotting changes in behavior, etc., that might indicate a problem. Symptoms can be very discreet, and if you don't know what to look for, you'll miss it.

More food for thought.
Stephanie

I need to set my pond up different. My filter is more than strong enough. It is just the debris the turltes drag in clog it. I am thinl of setting up more of a stream than a pond this time. I understand aabout contradiction in my posts. For insstance I said in my last post that I let all my painted turtles go.I did not. I thought so but two have been hiding in my enclosure. It is just a pain to go into all the details. I found a small snapper in there also.

Hopefully you'll be able to regain control over the situation there and maintain a smaller, but healthier, group of turtles. It really pays to keep track of them, beieve me.

I didn't plant blackberries in the enclosure here for the very reason you'd mentioned: I'd like to be able to reach our turtles to check them out.

Regards,
Stephanie