Baby pyramiding or normal?

[SarahM82]

Tortie, from what I can guess is only a couple of months old. This is how his/her shell was when we found him/her. Is this normal for being a new baby or is he/she starting to pyramid? We do daily warm soaks (which tortie LOVES, I usually do it around the same time every day and if I'm late tortie lets me know. He/she will go nuts trying to climb the glass of the aquarium until I get him/her out to soak) and I always keep a full and fresh bowl of water in for him/her. The habitat isn't humid like it needs to be but I plan on fixing that soon. I have read the above but I'm a visual learner so seeing set ups better "teaches" me and I seen one posted recently so now I have a better idea of how to achieve a humid enclosure.

 

[Tom]

The notch around all the scutes is the first stage of pyramiding. Improving conditions will hopefully stop it from progressing further.

The daily soaks will be a big help, but having a humid hide and higher humidity will help more. Spraying the shell several times a day with water will help too.

Have you seen all of these yet?
http://www.tortoiseforum.org/threads/how-to-raise-a-healthy-sulcata-or-leopard-version-2-0.79895/
http://www.tortoiseforum.org/threads/beginner-mistakes.45180/
http://www.tortoiseforum.org/threads/for-those-who-have-a-young-sulcata.76744/

Here is your visual for making a closed chamber:
http://www.tortoiseforum.org/threads/closed-chambers.32333/

One more enclosure to look at. THe experiment was not all that successful, so I would mostly ignore the text:
http://www.tortoiseforum.org/threads/2015-growth-experiment.119874/

 

[Markw84]

IF you're interested... Here's my enclosure I made when I moved to my new house. It is constructed per Tom's threads above except I made double pane doors. It is made to slide perfectly into some cabinets in my 2nd garage where I keep no cars, but most of my turtle and tortoise things, incubator, etc. so the way Tom built with 1 1'2' insulation worked great - plus the double pane doors. RIght now that garage is 49 degrees, but inside is a toasty 80 cool side 90 warm side, 101 basking, and 85% humidity. Note the condensation on the windows. Using the kilowatt meter for 2 weeks showed its costing $1.68 a week to run. Not BAD!

 

[SarahM82]

That's what I was afraid of I will check these links out, thank you. I will also start spraying its shell throughout the day.

The notch around all the scutes is the first stage of pyramiding. Improving conditions will hopefully stop it from progressing further.

The daily soaks will be a big help, but having a humid hide and higher humidity will help more. Spraying the shell several times a day with water will help too.

Have you seen all of these yet?
http://www.tortoiseforum.org/threads/how-to-raise-a-healthy-sulcata-or-leopard-version-2-0.79895/
http://www.tortoiseforum.org/threads/beginner-mistakes.45180/
http://www.tortoiseforum.org/threads/for-those-who-have-a-young-sulcata.76744/

Here is your visual for making a closed chamber:
http://www.tortoiseforum.org/threads/closed-chambers.32333/

One more enclosure to look at. THe experiment was not all that successful, so I would mostly ignore the text:
http://www.tortoiseforum.org/threads/2015-growth-experiment.119874/

 

[SarahM82]

That's awesome... Looks great. Can't wait to get something like this built for our baby.

IF you're interested... Here's my enclosure I made when I moved to my new house. It is constructed per Tom's threads above except I made double pane doors. It is made to slide perfectly into some cabinets in my 2nd garage where I keep no cars, but most of my turtle and tortoise things, incubator, etc. so the way Tom built with 1 1'2' insulation worked great - plus the double pane doors. RIght now that garage is 49 degrees, but inside is a toasty 80 cool side 90 warm side, 101 basking, and 85% humidity. Note the condensation on the windows. Using the kilowatt meter for 2 weeks showed its costing $1.68 a week to run. Not BAD!View attachment 160602

 

[SarahM82]

Okay, so I did a then (December 10th, when we found Tortie) and now (this last week) because my husband and oldest daughter kept saying torte is definitely getting bigger but I couldn't see it. With the pics I see that the space between the scutes is definitely getting wider. So, with these pics does it look like the pyramiding is getting better? worse? same and he/she is just getting bigger? I have no idea what to look for in terms of it getting better or worse.

I have also started weighing Tort and I definitely do not think he/she is a couple of months old, like i previously thought. I'm thinking when we found him/her on December 10th that he/she must have only been a week or so old (going off weight from other babies here). However, how long can it take for a baby to start pyramiding? If Tortie was only a week or so old could there already be pyramiding like there was when we found him/her?

Here is Torties weigh ins:

1/1/16 - 45 grams
1/2/16 - 48 grams
1/3/16 - 49 grams
1/4/16 - 49 grams
1/5/16 - 50 grams
1/6/16 - 51 grams

 

[Tom]

If you have a clear picture of the tortoise's face when you first got it, I can give you a better age estimate. The pic above in this thread is too blurry.

Likewise, the pics in the post above are too small for me to see the growth details between the scutes.

Don't be discouraged though. It can take weeks or months to see improvement after correcting the environment. Steady weight gain is a good sign.

 

[SarahM82]

Here are the best pictures I have of his/her face the day we found him/her. Thanks for looking

 

[yillt]

Here are the best pictures I have of his/her face the day we found him/her. Thanks for looking

He may have the TINIEST bit of pyramiding but it's absolutely minimal. He is very cute Good luck and maybe spray his cage once more than usual

 

[Tom]

Here are the best pictures I have of his/her face the day we found him/her. Thanks for looking

I can just barely see a little remnant of the egg tooth there. They usually lose the egg tooth by about 6 weeks. Sometimes a little longer in dry raised ones. It would still be fairly prominent in a two week old.

Your tortoise was most likely 4-5 weeks old when you got him, but we could only be sure if we know the actual hatch date.

 

[SarahM82]

He may have the TINIEST bit of pyramiding but it's absolutely minimal. He is very cute Good luck and maybe spray his cage once more than usual

I spray his tank a few times a day. Thank you, I think he/she is pretty darn adorable.

 

[SarahM82]

Wow, that makes me think that before we found him/her in our field he/she wasn't eating well. Definitely gaining and thriving now thank you for looking and being so much help!!

I can just barely see a little remnant of the egg tooth there. They usually lose the egg tooth by about 6 weeks. Sometimes a little longer in dry raised ones. It would still be fairly prominent in a two week old.

Your tortoise was most likely 4-5 weeks old when you got him, but we could only be sure if we know the actual hatch date.

 

[Moozillion]

Gosh, he's a little cutie!!!

 

[Markw84]

I just noticed - you're in Valley Springs. Not that far from me. If you found this baby tortoise in a field near you in December, it could not have been there too long. Through all Dec our average low was 39 and high was 58. The last week the average low was 32 and high of 52. Not much sun either. Can't imagine a little guy like that surviving very long at all or having any energy to be out in a place you could find him. Amazing. He's so lucky you did happen to find him/her. How did you happen to spot it? Was it close to another fence and does anyone you know around you have Sulcatas?

 

[Yvonne G]

(Just and FYI - tortoises are measured in a straight line, front to back, not over the curve)

 

[Yvonne G]

I just noticed - you're in Valley Springs. Not that far from me. If you found this baby tortoise in a field near you in December, it could not have been there too long. Through all Dec our average low was 39 and high was 58. The last week the average low was 32 and high of 52. Not much sun either. Can't imagine a little guy like that surviving very long at all or having any energy to be out in a place you could find him. Amazing. He's so lucky you did happen to find him/her. How did you happen to spot it? Was it close to another fence and does anyone you know around you have Sulcatas?

If he hatched out in someone's back yard, it's likely a bird carried him away and dropped him.

 

[Markw84]

I've seen that as well but would you expect one to be hatching in mid Dec with the weather we had?

 

[Tom]

I've seen that as well but would you expect one to be hatching in mid Dec with the weather we had?

Lots of times they hatch and stay underground until it rains. I've gotten ground hatch babies in late November before. I think they hatch underground in September and just stay down there until it rains or I put the sprinklers on that area. I make it a point to saturate every inch of the enclosure in early October every year now.

 

[SarahM82]

He was resting up against a piece of pipe out in our field. My son was running around in the field with all the wild bunnies and spotted him. We are on 7.5 acres. It's a 5 acre minimum here so we knew he had to have come from either the people to the side of us or the people behind us. We had our sons ask the people to the side of us (their daughters) if they had a turtle. They said they did. That they had a momma and 12 babies. I knew right then that, that is where he came from. We don't know if he came over on his own or if he was picked up and dropped here. Either way, I knew we were not going to let them know we had him and definitely weren't going to give him to them. Apparently they have momma and babies (if they're still alive at this point) outside (no heat, nothing just outside fending for themselves) in their "pond" which is just a nasty filthy hole filled with stuff I wouldn't even consider water. They have hundreds of animals over there. They have dogs that run around free and could get them, trash everywhere. It's a zoo and a dump all in one. So there's no way I'm handing this little guy back over to them. He some how managed to get to our property so we are going to give him an amazing life.

When we found him he was very cold and his skin was almost pale looking or something. Much lighter than it is now. He was hungry. We fed him some greens that we had in the fridge and got him under lights. I knew that basic stuff. Since then I have been educating the heck out of myself on sulcatas and learning how to give him the best life possible and loving every min of it.

 

[SarahM82]

Just had to post an update, man has tortie grown TONS in the last 3 weeks. And I'm happy to report, NO MORE pyramiding. Question, as he/she grows will the tiny bit of pyramiding that has already happened flatten out? Also In the last pic (under side of his/her shell), do those 2 spots look normal? It almost looks like bruising or something under the shell, even though I know that is not possible as he/she hasn't been dropped or anything.