Bumpy tortoise

[GemmaR]

Hello,
I got a new tortoise about 6 months ago, I felt quite sorry for her because she was being kept in quite poor conditions, in a guinea pig cage with loads of other tortoises and on a towel (her claws and beak were very long). Her shell is quite bumpy and she is quite small for her age compared to our other tortoises (four years old). After about six months she is now looking much healthier. We've filed down her claws and beak a bit, she's on a diet of weeds and her eyes are much brighter. She's also much better at lifting herself up and stomping around the tortoise table.

I'm still a bit worried about her because she doesn't really seem to be putting on much weight. I feed her a wide variety of weeds (when I can find them), sprinkled daily with ground up cuttle fish and every few days with nutrobal. I also have been bathing her. She obviously has the proper UV light and a large tortoise table! Is there anything else I should be doing? Is it usual for tortoises to sometimes not put on weight immediately after they've been kept in poor conditions?

[Catwoman63]

Good for you for taking her home, it will take time to undo previous damage, you are doing all the right things, how big is she, have you measured her? And what species is she
X

[GemmaR]

She's a spur-thighed and has a shell length of about 9 cm. Her legs and head look a bit too big for her body though!!

[rachel.mather]

Hello,
It might be worth checking to see if she has worms, as mine did.
There's a great website called wormcount.com (or similar) and you order a kit and send them a sample.
It took me quite a while to get mine worm free and I eventually ended up getting the vets to worm him (which was surprisingly cheap!)
Hope this was helpful

[GemmaR]

She seems quite alert - especially compared to our others who are beginning to get a bit sleepy from the shorter days. We thought about checking her for worms, maybe its a good idea to be sure!

[Pussygalore]

Can I just say that there are many owners that use indoor guinea pig/rabbit cages for torts and even some that choose to use towels although heaven knows why apart from when a tort is ill when they are used to cleanliness purposes rather than soil. Also that not all torts grow at the same rate and you'll often find the equivalent of a runt in a hatching, one thats smaller and never does as well as the rest.

[Suze65]

I agree with all of the above. It can definitely take a few months of recovery, and she may be a slower grower, they all can all grow at a slightly different rate to each other . And it is worth getting her tested for worms, just one point about that, when you send off her poop sample, send three samples from three different days, because when they poop , the worm eggs are not always shed, you can put it all in one pot, this way you get a more accurate result.

[GemmaR]

Sorry, I wasn't really complaining about the guinea pig cage - I've seen some pictures of amazing set ups in them! It was really that there were so many tortoises in the same one and that they were kept on a towel year round rather than as an emergency measure. Maybe that's not quite as bad as I'd thought, I was just a bit surprised at the condition of the tortoises!

She actually seems to be picking up even in the last few days and her appetite is much better than it had been in months!! Thanks for all your advice!

[Suze65]

That's good news, sounds like she is improving slowly, just keep doing what your doing.