Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I was wondering what might be wrong with a RES with swollen eyes.

I read a little about water quality... i change the water out once a week.. and about every two three weeks clean the entire thing. I have a wisper water tank filter... I either buy distilled water form the market or leave water sittin out for a couple days...

I can't find any pics that show swollen eyes so i can't compare...it seems like her eyes are swollen...(i could just be paraniod)

When i got her, she came with a tank with gravel in it.. i want to take it out becuase all the crap and skin settle to the bottom and is soooooooooo hard to get out of the gravel.

Is it necessary to have gravel at the bottom.. i know he digs throught it but i would like to get rid of it so it is easier to clean out.

Swollen eyes can be a symptom of a respitory infection, which can lead to death. Better not take the risk. Take the little guy to a Reptile vet as soon as possible.

Gravel is not necessary. A lot of people do not use it, and if it is small gravel it can be dangerous. RES will often try to eat it and will get impacted. This can lead to an expensive vet bill or even death. Other people like the appearance of a substrate bottom and use River Rock. A bag is pretty cheap at your local home improvement store, however, it does still accumulate debris. It is simply a matter if prefrence and how much time you want to spend cleaning.

Sorry to sound so glum, hope your little guy gets better. If he is sick, raising the water temp to 80 - 82 degrees can help, but is not a cure. Having had a RES get a resp. infection this past spring, I cannot stress enough taking him to a vet. I caught it early and am happy to say that he recovered 100% after a weeks worth of antibiotics.

Good Luck.

-----
Jenea

1:3 Eastern Hognose
0:0:1 Florida Redbelly Snake
0:1 Gulf Coast Box Turtle
1:1 Red-eared Slider
2:0 Cats
1:1 Kids
1:0 Spouse

Thanks for you help..
looking at the picture his eyes seem to be normal.. but i still have an appointment with the vet

I have to take my cat to be fixed so i called and he said to bring him even...for the eyes and just a check up.

you were very helpful... THANKS

Hopefully your vet is familiar with turtles. Are the eyes
open or closed? From experience the first thing a vet would
want to do is give it a shot of Vitamin A. For some reason
this is way overdone and sometimes it can cause illness or
even death.

If your turtle eats a good diet, he does not have a vitamin
A deficiency so I wouldn't let the vet give it. If the eyes
are swollen or closed, I suspect a respiratory infection.

What does your turtle eat and does it have a basking area
and heat and UVB light?

Linda

I feed him two things reptomin (thats what he came with) and i mix it with another food i forget the name.. its a white circular bottom but i wanted to make sure he was getting D3 and calcium ( i looked at the nutrition of the reptomin and it doesnt have D3...so i feed him both)

I have a basking lamp from zoomeds which he came with as well
and i went out like two weeks a ago and bought the ultraviolet light.. i dont have them going at the same time... i alternate them.

His eyes actually got much better they are open...they were a little puffy around the outside of his eyes yesterday morning.. but it seems to have gone down... last night i took all the gravel out of his cage. changed the filters in the wisperer and washed everything out with water.

The vet i go to takes exotics... i used to bring my rabbit their a couple years ago...

cholecalciferol is in reptomin and is vitamin D3. i used to tell everyone reptomin was horrible because it didnt have aby vitD3, but i found out i was wrong. i still think reptomin is probably the worse, but it just isnt as bad as i thought it was. the only other name for vitD3 i know is d-activated animal sterol. but still many foods is the best. rather than mix it i just rotate, one food today, a different one tomorrow and a different one the next day. gives variety and keeps them guessing.

I would set them up to be on at the same time. The fluorescent
bulbs do not give out enough heat. I always utilize both
over the basking area.

You can put them on a timer purchased from Walmart to have
them come on say 7am and shut off at 7pm.

Good luck
Linda