# Poisonous Mushrooms Can Be Deadly



## Ciri (Sep 28, 2014)

Recently my desert tortoise ate a poisonous mushroom that had come up in the backyard without my knowledge. Apparently due to the monsoon rains we get here in Tucson, these mushrooms can come up anywhere. Now that I have learned more, I know many of the poisonous ones are white or brown, but may be other colors too. My tortoise became very ill, was treated by a veterinarian who is a reptile specialist, but did not survive. I removed the mushrooms, but they've come back repeatedly. I'm looking into how to treat the soil so that mushrooms will be unlikely to grow there. A gardener told me to use sulfur, so I'm looking into organic sulfur to put down the ground to change the pH and prevent mushrooms from growing there. It's a very tiny patch of the backyard, and the mushrooms were really hard to see as most of them blended in with the grass. I wanted to warn others who have desert tortoises in hopes no one else has to go through this.


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## wellington (Sep 28, 2014)

Hello,and Welcome. So sorry it's under these conditions. So sorry for your loss. Thank you very much for joining this great forum to warn us of these mushrooms and how fatel they are. I do hope you stick around. Again, I am so sorry.


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## Prairie Mom (Sep 28, 2014)

Ciri said:


> Recently my desert tortoise ate a poisonous mushroom that had come up in the backyard without my knowledge. Apparently due to the monsoon rains we get here in Tucson, these mushrooms can come up anywhere. Now that I have learned more, I know many of the poisonous ones are white or brown, but may be other colors too. My tortoise became very ill, was treated by a veterinarian who is a reptile specialist, but did not survive. I removed the mushrooms, but they've come back repeatedly. I'm looking into how to treat the soil so that mushrooms will be unlikely to grow there. A gardener told me to use sulfur, so I'm looking into organic sulfur to put down the ground to change the pH and prevent mushrooms from growing there. It's a very tiny patch of the backyard, and the mushrooms were really hard to see as most of them blended in with the grass. I wanted to warn others who have desert tortoises in hopes no one else has to go through this.


My heart just breaks for you! I'm so sorry you had to go through this and think you are so thoughtful to warn others. Take care!


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## Jacqui (Sep 28, 2014)

I am sorry to read this. Did you happen to take a picture of the type of mushroom you had this horrible issue with?


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## ascott (Sep 28, 2014)

I am sorry for the ordeal you and the tort had to endure.....how did the vet determine that the source of poison was a mushroom? Which type did the vet identify...?


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## Ciri (Sep 28, 2014)

wellington said:


> Hello,and Welcome. So sorry it's under these conditions. So sorry for your loss. Thank you very much for joining this great forum to warn us of these mushrooms and how fatel they are. I do hope you stick around. Again, I am so sorry.


 Thank you very much. Yes, I will stick around.


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## Ciri (Sep 28, 2014)

Prairie Mom said:


> My heart just breaks for you! I'm so sorry you had to go through this and think you are so thoughtful to warn others. Take care!


 Thank you. It's been a nightmare which I hope no other tortoise and their human ever has to ever endure.


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## Ciri (Sep 28, 2014)

ascott said:


> I am sorry for the ordeal you and the tort had to endure.....how did the vet determine that the source of poison was a mushroom? Which type did the vet identify...?



The vet determined that he was sick from a poisonous mushroom by doing a blood test. The test showed that he had very low blood sugar and blood protein. This is an indicator of toxic mushroom poisoning. After he'd told me that I searched my yard and found the mushrooms in question. I gave him samples and he confirmed that they were indeed poisonous. The white mushroom was particularly poisonous, but the brown mushrooms were poisonous as well. There was a small bite taken out of the white mushroom, and that mushroom was growing in dirt without any grass around it. The brown mushrooms were hidden in the grass. He was most suspicious of the white mushroom, but it was unclear whether he was sure that was it or not.

I removed the mushrooms but they came back six days later. I removed them again and they were back three days later. I had a hard time finding all of them, so someone helped me and he found a few more that I was able to see.


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## ascott (Sep 28, 2014)

> MUSHROOMS IN LAWN
> Why They Form, And How To Get Rid of Them
> 
> 
> ...


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## bouaboua (Sep 28, 2014)

Oh, so sorry to hear your lost. But very welcome to have you here.


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## Yellow Turtle01 (Sep 30, 2014)

I am so sorry to hear about your poor tortoise!  Thank you for telling us about your mushrooms, they are so hard to know about, and identify!


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## rabbidbros10 (Sep 30, 2014)

I'm sorry for your loss


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## Tom (Sep 30, 2014)

Welcome Ciri. Thank you for the warning.

We get the same thing here periodically and I once had a dog get pretty sick from eating a shroom.


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## Ciri (Sep 30, 2014)

Jacqui said:


> I am sorry to read this. Did you happen to take a picture of the type of mushroom you had this horrible issue with?



These are the mushrooms he could have eaten. The veterinarian thought that it was likely to be a highly toxic white mushroom. As you can see in the picture, it looks like a bite was taken out of it the white one. It may not have been the one he ate, though. Also, the brown mushrooms were well disguised in the grass.


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## Ciri (Sep 30, 2014)

Thank you very much for the mushroom information. A master gardener at the University of Arizona told me to use sulfur. I found organic sulfur through a local company which is also online called Arbico.. I'm looking into whether that will be safe for my box turtles and any tortoise I may adopt in the future. The gardner explained that I need to change the pH of the soil, and that I could also do this in a slower way with ground-up eggshells and/or salt. I have found that each time I take the mushrooms out, if there is even just a little bit of rain they return within 3 to 6 days, so I know I need to do something more.


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## SouthernBelle (Jun 2, 2017)

My tortoise also ate a mushroom the other day and is not doing well. In your case the vet determined cause of illness but was there not some kind of treatment, or is it just one of those things that little can be done? Thank you.


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## Yvonne G (Jun 2, 2017)

This is a pretty old thread. We'll need to send an alert to call her back to the thread - @Ciri


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## Ciri (Jun 13, 2017)

SouthernBelle said:


> My tortoise also ate a mushroom the other day and is not doing well. In your case the vet determined cause of illness but was there not some kind of treatment, or is it just one of those things that little can be done? Thank you.


My apologies that I did not see this sooner. My veterinarian did everything he could but unfortunately my tortoise ate a particularly poisonous mushroom, I didn't catch it soon enough, and he passed away. It is possible to save them, especially if it's caught within a couple of hours, or maybe within a day, it all depends on the specifics of that situation. Eating a less poisonous mushroom could be survivable. How is your tortoise doing now? I hope he/she is doing better.


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## TammyJ (Jun 14, 2017)

Thank you for starting this post with this really useful information, but I am very sorry for the loss of your tortoise.
I know nothing about mushrooms. I thought it was toadstools that were poisonous??!!


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## Ciri (Jun 14, 2017)

TammyJ said:


> Thank you for starting this post with this really useful information, but I am very sorry for the loss of your tortoise.
> I know nothing about mushrooms. I thought it was toadstools that were poisonous??!!


 This is an interesting question. I asked my veterinarian about the distinction between mushrooms and toadstools, and he explained that they are the same. It's certain varieties of mushrooms (toadstools) which are deadly poisonous. I've learned more about them and come to the conclusion that the best approach is to remove any and all mushrooms from the tortoise's living area. It is so hard to identify them correctly as to poisonous or not, it's just better to play it safe.


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## Loohan (Jun 15, 2017)

Ciri said:


> Thank you very much for the mushroom information. A master gardener at the University of Arizona told me to use sulfur. I found organic sulfur through a local company which is also online called Arbico.. I'm looking into whether that will be safe for my box turtles and any tortoise I may adopt in the future. The gardner explained that I need to change the pH of the soil, and that I could also do this in a slower way with ground-up eggshells and/or salt. I have found that each time I take the mushrooms out, if there is even just a little bit of rain they return within 3 to 6 days, so I know I need to do something more.



Sounds nuts to me. Sulfur is used by gardeners to ACIDIFY soil, whereas eggshells and salt are very ALKALINE. Both will change your pH, but in opposite directions.
Also too much salt will harm your plants.


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## Linda C (May 26, 2021)

Ciri said:


> These are the mushrooms he could have eaten. The veterinarian thought that it was likely to be a highly toxic white mushroom. As you can see in the picture, it looks like a bite was taken out of it the white one. It may not have been the one he ate, though. Also, the brown mushrooms were well disguised in the grass.
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