And a Veterinarian says so...I freakin don't know how this post and 1 million comments to it got dumped on me and now I'm just gonna go lay down.
I don't know when and I don't remember commenting but my comment is there and I read some of the comments about how stupid I was for not understanding that Sulcata come from Africa in a hot dry climate and more than a few thousand comments repeated how too much water and soaking causes pyramiding. I realty am not exaggerating the number. It's disappointing and scary. And I do believe there are more of them then there is us, and most captive Sulcata will grow pyramided and it will become the norm. Sad..
TORTOISE 101
DO NOT SOAK YOUR TORTOISE DAILY!
(Even I learned something new today. I stand corrected. For all those I adviced about soaking, please read further)
Routinely soaking sulcata tortoises is wrong and unnatural. Daily soaking should only take place if there is a specific medical reason for doing so
The reason soaking is recommended by some, as I understand it, is to prevent pyramiding, an abnormal distortion of the tortoise’s carapace that is characterized by deformed, pyramid-shaped scutes.
The typical recommendation is that the tortoise soak in shallow warm water for 15 to 30 minutes anywhere from once a day to multiple times a day.
There is no scientific research to support the idea that soaking the plastron really does anything to stop pyramiding.
What does happen frequently is that the animal defecates in the water when soaking. If this happens several times a day or several times a week, you are interfering with the animal’s natural digestive transit time. The food is passing through the gut too quickly. Bad husbandry hinders the fermentation time needed to obtain the ultimate value of all the nutrients.
Keep a pan or saucer of water at the cool end of the enclosure; the tortoise will use it when it needs to drink or wants to soak.
Soaking is an unnatural, artificial solution to an unnatural, artificial problem caused by unnatural, artificial husbandry and habitat
In fact, this may well be a contributing factor to pyramiding. The scutes (keratin) absorb a lot of water and become very soft. The expansion and contraction of the keratin causes a lot of stress on the underlying bone. In an indoor enclosure, if the habitat temperature is high and the humidity is too low, the keratin can contract (dry out) too fast, causing the carapace bone structure to be drawn upward. The more dry the keratin becomes, the thicker it becomes, so up it goes, creating more stress to the carapace bone to follow. Get the temperature and humidity under control!
On a personal note, I believe now that it is more important to keep a proper humidity level than putting tortoise in water. We can regulate the humidity with a humidifier (olx, Lazada, I use Crane humidifiers) and a hygrometer.
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Look at that baby...his bridge is already starting to flare up. I'm beginning to think nothing we do will change things
I don't know when and I don't remember commenting but my comment is there and I read some of the comments about how stupid I was for not understanding that Sulcata come from Africa in a hot dry climate and more than a few thousand comments repeated how too much water and soaking causes pyramiding. I realty am not exaggerating the number. It's disappointing and scary. And I do believe there are more of them then there is us, and most captive Sulcata will grow pyramided and it will become the norm. Sad..
TORTOISE 101
DO NOT SOAK YOUR TORTOISE DAILY!
(Even I learned something new today. I stand corrected. For all those I adviced about soaking, please read further)
The reason soaking is recommended by some, as I understand it, is to prevent pyramiding, an abnormal distortion of the tortoise’s carapace that is characterized by deformed, pyramid-shaped scutes.
The typical recommendation is that the tortoise soak in shallow warm water for 15 to 30 minutes anywhere from once a day to multiple times a day.
There is no scientific research to support the idea that soaking the plastron really does anything to stop pyramiding.
What does happen frequently is that the animal defecates in the water when soaking. If this happens several times a day or several times a week, you are interfering with the animal’s natural digestive transit time. The food is passing through the gut too quickly. Bad husbandry hinders the fermentation time needed to obtain the ultimate value of all the nutrients.
Keep a pan or saucer of water at the cool end of the enclosure; the tortoise will use it when it needs to drink or wants to soak.
In fact, this may well be a contributing factor to pyramiding. The scutes (keratin) absorb a lot of water and become very soft. The expansion and contraction of the keratin causes a lot of stress on the underlying bone. In an indoor enclosure, if the habitat temperature is high and the humidity is too low, the keratin can contract (dry out) too fast, causing the carapace bone structure to be drawn upward. The more dry the keratin becomes, the thicker it becomes, so up it goes, creating more stress to the carapace bone to follow. Get the temperature and humidity under control!
On a personal note, I believe now that it is more important to keep a proper humidity level than putting tortoise in water. We can regulate the humidity with a humidifier (olx, Lazada, I use Crane humidifiers) and a hygrometer.
3434
17 comments
18 shares
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Comment
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Look at that baby...his bridge is already starting to flare up. I'm beginning to think nothing we do will change things
