Reptile & Amphibian Forums

My sister had 5 sulcata babies that were outside some of the summer. After a month or so they started getting soft bellies, quit eating and 4 of them have died. One is still alive, but it is not eating now and its belly is soft. The breeder of them has told her when this happens they probably ate something that was toxic and there is nothing that can be done to save them. She was told that by the time they appeared sick the damage had been done to their insides and they could not be saved. Has anyone had this problem and what did you do?

Do you have any idea what kind of plants the torts were arround?
If it is poison plants which it could be if you could narrow the plants list down then there is a good possibility they were poisoned and that greatly affects the liver and internal organs.

With the last one still alive I would move this feller to warm dry areas, soakings to keep them hydrated and a vet visit would be helpful.

She thought anemone was one of the plants. What could a vet do??

I'm not familiar with that plant. There may be another underlying issue here that a vet can see that "we" can not.
If you do take this little one to a vet make sure it's a reptile vet.

Keep us updated.

Anemones are on one of the toxic plant lists that I looked up. And unfortunately I do not have a reptile vet anywhere close. I made some green weed "soup" with calcium and I have been trying to get it to drink a little. She was going on the advice of a big tortoise breeder that it was too late to do anything. Will keep trying the soup.

I'm wondering about the calcium.. were they not getting enough before you started making the soup with it added.
Call around to all the local vets because sometimes you can find a vet to help treat even if they are not reptile vets.
Some vets are willing to try & they can contact reptile vets by phone or via Internet when they have to consult.

Good luck I hope they pull through.
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PHRatz

I actually had an experience very similar to this last summer. I had two large male sulcatas and four smaller males (worst luck in the world), and since I couldn't find a female at the time, I decided to make a long term shot out of it and raise a small group. I first got five, all but one of whom died in much the same fashion you described. They stopped eating, their bellies grew soft, and over a few days, simply died. I then purchased a second group of three, quarantined from the one living animal (I thought that maybe the one could've had some disease he had transmitted to the others). This time, in a completely different enclosure, all three of my new babies died. I had never had such a thing happen to me before, and I've raised over half a dozen young sulcatas to adulthood. Not to be deterred, I went ahead and bought two yearlings, thinking that they'd have a better shot at survival. They too began showing signs of illness. I took one of the animals to the vet, and he couldn't figure it out. He suggested poisoning to be the culprit, or a simple lack of calcium. But this didn't make any sense, as I had six males all over a foot in length roaming my back yard, having lived there since they were hatchlings, on the same ground on which these hatchlings became mysteriously ill. Four days later, both of the yearlings were dead. What's more, the one hatchling who survived the hand of death for so long was killed by a skunk that dug under the walls of his enclosure in the middle of the night (I set out a trap the following night and caught the pest; animal control released him into a less urban setting). I felt horrible after this experience, and it has caused me to shy away from keeping hatchling sulcatas.

But for the life of me, I couldn't figure out what was killing these kids. They couldn't have been poisoned. I'm an attentive gardener, and I use no pesticides or fertilizers, nor do I encourage the growth of any plant that is not immediately beneficial to the sulcatas. Buffalo, kikuyu, bermuda, and winter grass grow in abundance over my entire property. I grow cacti, hibiscus, mulberry, dandelion and althea (flowers, not leaves) in the summer, and I grow romaine lettuce in the winter. I supplement my animals' diet with calcium, despite the abundance of it in the South Texas soil, not to mention the innumerable sunny days. I couldn't understand what was going wrong. My larger animals thrive, as do any animals I'm fortunate enough to babysit. The weather here in South Texas is perfect; I'd raised sulcatas with no problems until now.

So, I have to wonder if this mass death was perhaps not my fault. Perhaps the breeder didn't provide his females with enough calcium during their gestation period. Perhaps the female is overproducing eggs. Keep in mind that sulcatas in the wild often go years without producing a clutch, and even then, they tend to produce only a single clutch per year. Contrast this with many breeders I've met who get up to three or four clutches a year, up to six according to some literature I've read.

Another thought I had was poisoning via allergens or inhalents, something that perhaps one of my neighbors was pumping into the air, like a roach fogger or soemthing of the like. These would perhaps not be enough to cause any problems with larger animals, but could potentially kill hatchlings.

I fully realize that I have no concrete evidence to back up my point, that such is mere speculation. But it is something worth investigating, in my opinion. I can tell you that I will never keep hatchling sulcatas any time soon, unless I have them set up indoors.

T.G.

Wow--thanks for sharing that story, I can't even begin to imagine what went wrong or why they all died.
Sulcatas are very hardy creatures and I have one baby right now who's unstoppable when it comes to eating, roaming, and climbing.
Have you ever had your soil tested?
At my old house for some reason I could never get plants to grow on one side of my yard, I couldn't even get a weed to grow ha ha, I went through many drought tolerant plants that usually grow like crazy with minimal to no water and even being on a drip system I had no luck with that part of my yard. My next step was to get the soil tested since I was convinced there was something in the ground but I never got to that point.

But again you mentioned that your plants grow great and are cautious about what soil you use and no pesticides etc.

Hmmmm

Yeah, I should have the soil tested. An analysis of pollen would probably be a good idea as well. I'm not aware of any studies on tortoises and allergens (odd, considering that most African tortoises seem readily suceptible to respiratory illnesses). You'd think with all of the endangered South African species (Psamobates, Homopus, etc.) that some study would have been done. Every late summer to early winter, I flush my big males' nostrils with a saline solution. Many of them get dry grass in their nose around this time, and prevention of nasal infections is better than seeking a cure when it has spread to the lungs.

However, the poorly managed breeding group is also a theory that still holds up, especially given the fact that I purchased all of my youngsters from a breeder in Austin, even the "yearlings."

But yes, sulcatas are normally very hardy tortoises. The first one I ever owned, Jerry, I bought twelve years ago when I was 13 years old and knew nothing about them. I was feeding the guy dog food, lettuce and zuchini (with some dandelion thrown in because I noticed him munching on it one day in his exercise pen) until I got my hands on Andy Highfield's Encyclopedia of Tortoises and Freshwater Turtles and realized that everything I was doing was wrong. I then changed him to an outdoor enclosure and started learning everything I could from my mother about gardening.

Today, Jerry is a 75 pound behemoth, who runs to my feet whenever I step out the back door, who pushes my potted plants and patio furniture around the yard, and who I can never trust to play nicely with the other boys in my colony. They really are wonderful animals, and everyone should be thankful that we have such fantastic animals sharing this planet with us. Truly my favorite species of tortoise, my favorite species period.

T.G.

I'm wondering too if their health problems stemmed from improper care of the mother.

Long story I'll shorten. My vet surgically removed 34 eggs from a gravid female who was egg bound. Eggs looked good so vet took 17 eggs & incubated them- the breeder/owner took the other half.
Only one egg from each batch hatched.
3 & 1/2 years later the baby that the vet incubated is doing fine, no pyramidding, looks perfect, vet keeps the baby on a fresh appropriate diet.
Breeder fed her baby pellet food only. That baby died about a year ago.
Breeder wasn't properly feeding mother tortoise or she wouldn't have become eggbound (again) in the first place.
Why would only 2 eggs hatch? I think because breeder wasn't feeding mother tortoise correctly to begin with.
That's why the baby is dead, breeder wasn't feeding correctly in the first place- pellet food only.
Thankfully, that breeder got out of the breeding game, I think she really needed to do that!

I think that your theory of care problems by the breeder before your babies were ever born is very plausible.
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PHRatz