Baby sulcata red skin around one eye

LoMein

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Hey everyone! I noticed that my little guy has what looks to me like irritated skin around his eye but I'm not sure what is causing this. I've noticed him scratching his eye and have been debating taking him to the vet but wanted to ask here first.

Since getting him I have been soaking him daily for about 20 mins. His basking temperature is kept around 100F during the day and ambient heat is maintained with multiple CHE's at night. Humidity is between 40-80% and he has a T5 10.0 strip UVB light. His substrate is composed of mostly cypress mulch w/ added sphagnum moss, some organic top soil, and then ZooMed reptisoil. Maybe his substrate is irritating him? I'm not quite sure. Any help or advice is greatly appreciated!


tort1.jpg
 

Tom

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How close is the T5 tube to the tortoise?

Soil should never be used as a tortoise substrate. It is made form composted yard waste and there is no way to know what is in it.

Moss should never be used with tortoises either. They eat it and it can cause an impaction.

This may help you:
 

Markw84

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The eye look fine. The skin under the eye looks stained. Have you fed something red lately?

I would change out the substrate as @Tom has recommended. Go to Green Acres Nursery. They have 2 cu ft bags of Micro Bark they sell. It is pure fir bark - the same as ReptiBark but about 1/8 th the cost.

You tortoise is pyramiding some. Its still quite early so if you can get humidity up over 80% constantly you tortoise will do much better. Read the care sheet Tom linked for you above. Follow that as closely as possible and you will end up with a healthy, beautiful, life-long friend.
 

LoMein

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Dec 30, 2021
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Location (City and/or State)
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Thank you for the advice. After seeing Toms comment I went to Home Depot last night and replaced all the substrate to orchid bark. Thanks for letting me know about Green Acres though! I will definitely check that out in the future.

The T5 light is about 10-11" away, please let me know if that should be adjusted. Also, I haven't fed anything red lately so my guess was that he was just irritated from the soil :(. Thank you for letting me know about the pyramiding so I can do my best to fix it, I'll be monitoring humidity closely.
 
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