3 of 3 leopard hatchlings dead - what went wrong?

JBurer

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Good evening,
In the last week I have lost 2 of the 3 hatchling leopard tortoises I had been raising for the past three months, with the 3rd tortoise in the final stages of death right now. My primary goal in reaching out to you is to try and understand what went wrong and how to prevent this from happening again. I've racked my brain over their care and can't seem to pinpoint anything obvious that I should have done differently. Not to steer my counsel, but the conclusion I keep coming to is that they were harmed during shipping and, despite showing some growth, were not going to make it regardless of what I did. I have since acquired 2 more hatchlings from a local breeder and they appear to be doing extremely well. I'm frankly terrified that I'm missing something, though, thus the novel I'm writing here for help. I appreciate in advance your advice and recommendations.

Before I get into some of the husbandry details, I'd like to put out there that I've owned various tortoise species for about 30 years now. While I followed the guidance of the specific breeder I acquired these from, bolstered by Fife's Leopard Tortoise book and care sheets on this forum, I successfully raised a pair of Leopards in the mid/late 90's, when it was commonplace to keep them on playsand and pyramiding's link to humidity weren't common knowledge. In retrospect, even with less than ideal conditions, they thrived in my care. Given my experience with them in the past, I found them to be a relatively easy species to care for (vs Panther Chameleons I've also experienced).

The first 3 tortoises arrived February 6th and looked good, though shy and not terribly active. I chalked that up to stress from the flight - but started to become concerned when, 3 days later, they still hadn't really eaten much - just a few bites and then no interest. Hatchlings I was accustomed to in the past (and now, with the 2 I purchased locally as a comparison) were little monsters, devouring everything in sight. I reached out to the breeder, a regular hatchling provider on kingsnake.com, who went through my setup, feeding, temp, etc and ultimately advised me to soak them every day vs every other day. I did and they seemed to improve.

A few weeks later, Feb 22, I reached back out to the breeder with a concern about them being lethargic... spending most of the day, eyes closed, under the heat lamp. They were all eating and growing well through March and into April.

I started to notice one of the tortoises fall behind a little in growth relative to the other two in April. Next her eyes began to stick shut (needing water to open them), shell got soft and in just a few days stop eating entirely and die. A week later the second tortoise went through the same steps and died earlier today... I came home from a business trip (gone 3 days... wife took excellent care of them while I was away) and now the 3rd tortoise is lethargic, won't eat, small feces and eyes stuck shut. This last one was always the best eater and most healthy - in fact Monday of this week (4 days ago) I had her outside, eating food like a champ, poops in every soaking (everyday).

I'll go into husbandry next... but based on what I've described so far, does anything jump out? Calcium deficiency? Vitamin A? Dehydration?

There was no mucus at the nostrils, and I keep temps above 70 at all times (per Fife's book and the breeder rec) so I am doubting respiratory problems.

Reading this thread from a few years back, it suggests tortoises can survive an incident, look fine and grow but ultimately die regardless of the care. Is that still general consensus?

http://www.tortoiseforum.org/threads/hatchling-failure-syndrome.23493/

Best,
John
 

JBurer

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A picture of the 3 tortoises when they arrived and their general enclosure (zoo med tortoise house)

20150206_154151.jpg 20150222_150046.jpg 20150222_151532.jpg
 
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JBurer

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Picture of second tortoise to pass... taken 4 or 5 days ago. New hatchling there for comparison.
Note eyes closed... even in the water.

20150426_084423.jpg 20150426_084428.jpg
 
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JBurer

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Here are a few close-ups I took the same day to show the breeder the tortoises eyes. There is also a side picture showing some odd discoloration / bruising I noticed.

20150426_171935.jpg 20150426_171950.jpg 20150426_171958.jpg 20150427_063402.jpg 20150427_063414.jpg
 
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mikeylazer

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Although I will be no help to the answer of to what went wrong, i notice you keep them on hay which is a very bad substrate. They need high humidity as hatchlings and hay does not hold moitsure. I know that due to lack of moisture and high temperaturs when they are so tiny can cause their organs to fail. Also you should not be keeping the sick ones with the healthy ones just in case. Especially do not soak them in the same water if it is worms or a bacteria.
 

JBurer

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Regarding husbandry - It's basically 100% out of Fife's book (which generally synchs with the care sheet on this forum and the breeder's recommendations).

I use an off the shelf Zoomed Tortoise house for an enclosure. Substrate was hay on top, damp coconut coir on bottom. Temp ranges from 95-100 in the basking spot to 75-80 in the hide. Gets to low 70's at night, but no lower. Had a temp / humidity probe in the enclosure along with a temp gun I used regularly to confirm everything.

As pictured earlier, I had a 75 watt incandescent bulb for a heat source and Exo Terra 10.0 desert UVB bulb compact florescent (breeder's recommendation). I'm reading several people state the compact flourescent bulbs can cause blindness - my tortoises were never blind. After a soak, they generally opened both eyes and were active. If their shells had not been soft, I think the bulb was the culprit.

Soaked 5-7x per week for 15 to 20 minutes in warm water.

Feeding - The tortoises wouldn't eat the Mazuri I gave them and I only saw 1 ever try to eat the carrot shavings or cucumber I left for them... so their primary diet was lettuce (romaine, green leaf, red leaf) that was "dusted" with small pieces of timothy hay so it stuck to the lettuce. I also used repcal calcium supplement dusted on the food every week or so. It is perhaps 6 months past the label date, but I understood calcium to remain fine long past those dates.

Humidity was generally about 50% througout the enclosure... though I believe the dark hide, which had a cool whip tub turned upside down in the partition with damn coir underneath, was probably much higher than the 50%. Would occasionally spray the enclosure and tortoises with a spray bottle every couple days to help the humidity... and re-wet the bottom layer of coir every week or so, particularly in the basking spot.

I didn't bring them outside as much as I would have liked during this period... but I did take their entire enclosure out 3 or 4 times. And took them for a few "walks" in the backyard. While I think this is sub-optimal, with the UVB light, I thought this should be sufficient?

Is the soft shell a give-away that they needed more natural sunlight, had a vitamin / mineral deficiency or related to something else entirely?
 

JBurer

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Although I will be no help to the answer of to what went wrong, i notice you keep them on hay which is a very bad substrate. They need high humidity as hatchlings and hay does not hold moitsure. I know that due to lack of moisture and high temperaturs when they are so tiny can cause their organs to fail. Also you should not be keeping the sick ones with the healthy ones just in case. Especially do not soak them in the same water if it is worms or a bacteria.


Thanks Mikey - there was actually a 2" damp layer of coconut coir under the hay to keep the humidity up. It took me awhile to cross-reference the other care sheets to highlight where my temps and whatnot were slightly different so my post with those details came later.

Agree on the cross-contamination and housing. Thanks for pointing that out.
 

JBurer

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Sure - here is the heat and the UVB

I have been told it is the vertical-tube compact fluorescent bulbs (not horizontal) that caused the issues. Report cited - http://www.uvguide.co.uk
 

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naturalman91

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i agree with the above, what may have happened is one got sick and it spread to all the other's any time you introduce two tortoise who've never been around each other not from the same source you should quarantine them for at least 6 months to make sure they're active and eating and neither is sick

the low 70's at night with high humidity is a big problem waiting to happen with respiratory issues or just getting to cold, for them to grow smoothly you want high humidity 80-90% and a ambient temp of at least 80F to avoid respiratory infection

you could get rid of the hay just fine to, i haven't seen a lot of the info you posted above such as your temps or humidity recommended here for a long time and almost nobody recommend the zoo med tortoise house because it's not big enough really and it can't hold a ambient heat or humidity a lot of us used closed chamber enclosure's that we build ourselfs

your UVB is a problem to it's known to cause eye damage because of the way the waves are distributed, they say they fixed this problem but there's no way to know the old bulbs from the new ones they didn't pull the old ones from shelves
 

JBurer

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Natural - the older 3 all came from the same breeder. 2 of those 3 are dead and the 3rd is not looking good.

The other 2 tortoises I purchased last week are from a separate breeder. Agree I need to keep them away from the last remaining tortoise from the first group.

Thanks for the comments on the temps. Do you think that is somehow related to soft shells? I had no issues with respiratory problems...

On the UVB suggestion - I've replaced it as of earlier today just to be safe. The tortoises were not blind when they died.
Thanks,
John

i agree with the above, what may have happened is one got sick and it spread to all the other's any time you introduce two tortoise who've never been around each other not from the same source you should quarantine them for at least 6 months to make sure they're active and eating and neither is sick

the low 70's at night with high humidity is a big problem waiting to happen with respiratory issues or just getting to cold, for them to grow smoothly you want high humidity 80-90% and a ambient temp of at least 80F to avoid respiratory infection

you could get rid of the hay just fine to, i haven't seen a lot of the info you posted above such as your temps or humidity recommended here for a long time and almost nobody recommend the zoo med tortoise house because it's not big enough really and it can't hold a ambient heat or humidity a lot of us used closed chamber enclosure's that we build ourselfs

your UVB is a problem to it's known to cause eye damage because of the way the waves are distributed, they say they fixed this problem but there's no way to know the old bulbs from the new ones they didn't pull the old ones from shelves
 

G-stars

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Reading this thread from a few years back, it suggests tortoises can survive an incident, look fine and grow but ultimately die regardless of the care. Is that still general consensus?

http://www.tortoiseforum.org/threads/hatchling-failure-syndrome.23493/

Yes this can be a possibility. However since it is out of your control now, try to save the other 3 with the absolute best care you can provide.

Definitely change out the bulb, may be a minor factor but can still be a deciding one.
 

naturalman91

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Natural - the older 3 all came from the same breeder. 2 of those 3 are dead and the 3rd is not looking good.

The other 2 tortoises I purchased last week are from a separate breeder. Agree I need to keep them away from the last remaining tortoise from the first group.

Thanks for the comments on the temps. Do you think that is somehow related to soft shells? I had no issues with respiratory problems...

On the UVB suggestion - I've replaced it as of earlier today just to be safe. The tortoises were not blind when they died.
Thanks,
John

the soft shell could be due to lack of uvb or lack of calcium i use T5HO arcadia 12% UVB fluorescent and it works great but it's on the pricey side

do you know how the hatchlings were kept before arriving to you?
 

JBurer

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the soft shell could be due to lack of uvb or lack of calcium i use T5HO arcadia 12% UVB fluorescent and it works great but it's on the pricey side

do you know how the hatchlings were kept before arriving to you?

They were kept by the breeder in conditions nearly identical to mine, right down to the bulbs, substrate type, temps and feeding details.
 

Tom

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I need to be straight with you. I'm just going to say it and not make attempts to sugar coat it. None of this is intend to be mean, its intended to help you understand the things that are going on. Here is my opinion of some things that are going on:
1. "Straight out of Fife's book": I don't agree with his way of doing it, and HE doesn't do it the way he describes in the book. He has a large baby room and does not use heat lamps. His night temps also stay warmer than 70.
2. The coil bulb might be the main source of your issue. If its a bad one and it burns their eyes, they do exactly what you describe. They get lethargic, shut their eyes and lose their appetite.
3. Humidity: Unless the enclosure is kept in a humid reptile room or outdoors in the deep south, there is no way you have 50% humidity in there. Sorry but that enclosure is all wrong. Wrong lighting, wrong substrate, too cold at night, wrong water bowl, having an open top is wrong and the ZooMed tortoise house is just the wrong enclosure to begin with. I know that last sentence is not what anyone wants to hear, but it has to be said. Here is the right way to do it: http://www.tortoiseforum.org/threads/how-to-raise-a-healthy-sulcata-or-leopard-version-2-0.78361/
http://www.tortoiseforum.org/threads/closed-chambers.32333/
http://www.tortoiseforum.org/threads/beginner-mistakes.45180/
4. In my thread entitled "Hatchling Failure Syndrome", which is all about how the breeder failed, I am not talking about an "incident". I am talking about a prolonged pattern of chronic dehydration from a lack of soaking, drinking water and overly low humidity. If the breeder started your babies nearly identical to the way you've been housing them, then this is likely your problem, or part of your problem.
5. While some contagious disease is a possibility that I cannot rule out from here, it is very unlikely. If they do have some contagious disease, it probably came from the breeder's place. Separating them at this point won't do anything but stress them further.

Okay. I know that was brutal, but at least now you know more about what has gone wrong and what the problem(s) might be. Please ask for clarification on any of the above. I'm terribly sorry that you or anyone else has to go through this. Please inform your breeder of what you have learned here. This is the only way we will stop this cycle of dead baby tortoises. The breeder might reject what you say, but after enough people come back to him with the same story and dead babies, any sane person will have to reconsider their position.
 

cmacusa3

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I don't know that you will ever know the true culprit. I had a Leopard hatchling do what your describing, I housed it in the same enclosure I kept my sulcata in when it was a hatchling and it tripled in size in the 3 months it lived in that enclosure (no they weren't in it at the same time). It was a closed chamber with the recommend heat and humidity on the care sheets on this site. My personal thought from everything I see on here that Leopard hatchlings can be fragile and sometimes there's nothing you can do. I do think once you had one get sick they should've been separated but that's hindsight now. I personally decided that the best way to get a Leopard is getting one that is no less than 4 months and 100 grams. Good luck with the new ones and I hope everything turns great.
 

Yvonne G

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Regarding husbandry - It's basically 100% out of Fife's book (which generally synchs with the care sheet on this forum and the breeder's recommendations).

I use an off the shelf Zoomed Tortoise house for an enclosure. Substrate was hay on top, damp coconut coir on bottom. Temp ranges from 95-100 in the basking spot to 75-80 in the hide. Gets to low 70's at night, but no lower. Had a temp / humidity probe in the enclosure along with a temp gun I used regularly to confirm everything.

As pictured earlier, I had a 75 watt incandescent bulb for a heat source and Exo Terra 10.0 desert UVB bulb compact florescent (breeder's recommendation). I'm reading several people state the compact flourescent bulbs can cause blindness - my tortoises were never blind. After a soak, they generally opened both eyes and were active. If their shells had not been soft, I think the bulb was the culprit.

Soaked 5-7x per week for 15 to 20 minutes in warm water.

Feeding - The tortoises wouldn't eat the Mazuri I gave them and I only saw 1 ever try to eat the carrot shavings or cucumber I left for them... so their primary diet was lettuce (romaine, green leaf, red leaf) that was "dusted" with small pieces of timothy hay so it stuck to the lettuce. I also used repcal calcium supplement dusted on the food every week or so. It is perhaps 6 months past the label date, but I understood calcium to remain fine long past those dates.

Humidity was generally about 50% througout the enclosure... though I believe the dark hide, which had a cool whip tub turned upside down in the partition with damn coir underneath, was probably much higher than the 50%. Would occasionally spray the enclosure and tortoises with a spray bottle every couple days to help the humidity... and re-wet the bottom layer of coir every week or so, particularly in the basking spot.

I didn't bring them outside as much as I would have liked during this period... but I did take their entire enclosure out 3 or 4 times. And took them for a few "walks" in the backyard. While I think this is sub-optimal, with the UVB light, I thought this should be sufficient?

Is the soft shell a give-away that they needed more natural sunlight, had a vitamin / mineral deficiency or related to something else entirely?

"Eyes Stuck Shut" is the blindness we refer to. I'm very sure your culprit was the compact fluorescent bulb. Once the eyes are closed they stop eating and this contributes to all the rest of the problems.

Septicemia shows up as bruising or red under the shell. Can't say that's what was wrong with your baby, though.

Humidity needs to be much higher than 50%. Going by the old printed word is outdated. Even the Fifes' reading material is outdated. Besides keepers in Germany, the Fife brothers were the first to start experimenting with the hot, humid method of raising babies, but this was AFTER they had written books showing the dry method.

Our care sheets for leopards and sulcatas (basically the same care) are up-to-the-minute baby tortoise care. They have been proven to help you raise healthy and smooth baby tortoises.

With this new batch of babies, ditch the compact fluorescent bulb and the straw, cover the habitat and keep the temperature and the humidity up in the 80's and I'm pretty sure you'll see a much different set of baby tortoises.
 

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