Help! Baby northern red bellied cooter floating

[threeinoneshampoo]

I have a northern red bellied cooter, I'm not sure how old he is but he's about an inch big and I've had him for three days. Ever since I put him in the tank he's been floating with his butt higher than his front. I'm pretty sure it's a gas issue but I'm super worried about accidentally harming him.

I've attached a photo of his tank setup, but I've replaced the heater with an adjustable one and the water temp is about 80-82 degrees F to help him digest. He hasn't eaten and spends most of his time basking. He has 0 signs of a respiratory infection. I'm taking him to the vet once I get paid and he is settled in and eating, or if he doesn't eat and keeps floating for over a week.

Is the water too deep for him? There is gravel at the bottom which I'm planning on switching out to play sand but I'm waiting until he's eating so I don't stress him out more. The filter *says* it's for a 30 gallon but it's pretty small and I'm also worried it won't filter the water enough. He's currently in a 10 gallon tank.

He is incapable of diving at all, he is constantly floating in the water and when he swims he sticks to the edges and tries to get traction off of them, so I think once I do the monthly big water change I'll set it up so he has more things to grab onto.

 

[threeinoneshampoo]

I'd also like to mention that the water quality readings are insane for a 3 day old tank, 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite, and about 10 ppm nitrate. I did get scared and dump some extra beneficial bacteria into the tank 2 days ago because my old test strips were reading a super high level of ammonia, but they were also kinda weird bc the middle stayed yellow and the edges were blue.

 

[Yvonne G]

Floating sometimes means pnuemonia.

Also, your lights need to hang straight down, not out at an angle like they are. All they do at that angle is provide light. The UV and heat are directed outward away from the dock.

 

[threeinoneshampoo]

Thank you, I did take the temps and his basking area is reading at 85 degrees, and about 2 inches above that the temp is reading 90-100 so I was worried about moving it closer since it's a 75 watt and I didn't wanna burn him.

 

[threeinoneshampoo]

Floating sometimes means pnuemonia.

Also, your lights need to hang straight down, not out at an angle like they are. All they do at that angle is provide light. The UV and heat are directed outward away from the dock.

I angled the light directly over and the basking temps read as over 100 F, and he doesn't show any other symptoms of pneumonia like floating on one side, ear swelling, eye/nasal discharge, etc. Only his butt floats.

 

[TammyJ]

I would put the turtle into much shallower water so he can't float, but still with the proper temperatures and light, until he can be seen by a good reptile vet who will be able to diagnose and treat him.

 

[mark1]

how long have you had this turtle ? was he just recently shipped ? not eating would be my first concern, if everything is ok they eat ..... find out what he was eating before you got him , feed him exactly that, try live foods .......... the floating could be from being shipped , parasites , or pneumonia are three things i know of ............ if you can't get him eating , the vet is a good idea ...... if the floating is from being shipped it will resolve itself ...... smaller container and shallow water could be helpful in getting him acclimated , baby turtles need to hide ....... i am assuming you've not had this guy long .....

 

[threeinoneshampoo]

how long have you had this turtle ? was he just recently shipped ? not eating would be my first concern, if everything is ok they eat ..... find out what he was eating before you got him , feed him exactly that, try live foods .......... the floating could be from being shipped , parasites , or pneumonia are three things i know of ............ if you can't get him eating , the vet is a good idea ...... if the floating is from being shipped it will resolve itself ...... smaller container and shallow water could be helpful in getting him acclimated , baby turtles need to hide ....... i am assuming you've not had this guy long .....

I've had him for 3 days, I got him from a friend of a friend who was going to release him if I didn't take him and was keeping him in poor conditions. His left eye was swollen closed and he was walking in circles when I got him but is now looking fine. I heard that it can take a couple weeks for them to get used to their new home and they don't eat when they're stressed, so I've been hoping that was the case. I've offered pellets, live incests, worms, dried mealworms, blueberries, parsley, and tuna, and he's refused all of it. I've been giving him vitamin an eye drops once a day. He is a lot more active now that his lights are off for the night.

I'll lower the water and give him some places to hide, thank you for your help! I'm currently waiting for my next paycheck to take him to the vet for a checkup but I'll take him much sooner if he doesn't get better within the next couple of days.

 

[mark1]

try small pieces of calves liver , and a smaller container with lots of cover and keep the coldest spot 80F ...... if his eye was swollen , along with everything else your describing , systemic antibiotics may be helpful or necessary .....

 

[threeinoneshampoo]

try small pieces of calves liver , and a smaller container with lots of cover and keep the coldest spot 80F ...... if his eye was swollen , along with everything else your describing , systemic antibiotics may be helpful or necessary .....

How does this look? I tried to add more wood to give him shaded hiding spots but he immediately got stuck so I removed it. I'm taking him to the vet tomorrow since they're not open weekends.

 

[mark1]

looks pretty good , some plastic or real plants would help .....you could probably stand to work on your filtration , maybe get a better understanding of it ......... as far as taking him to a vet , it's a judgement call that imo requires knowing/recognizing normal and abnormal ...... i've never taken a turtle to a vet that would eat .....

 

[threeinoneshampoo]

I'm gonna get him some sand and real plants he can chew on when I get paid next week, the filter is supposed to be for a 30 gallon but I'll see how well it does. Thank you for the help, he was super active and checked everything out before settling down for a nap. I do need to get him a general checkup and tested for parasites anyways. I've never owned a turtle before so I'm not quite sure what normal behavior is.

 

[TammyJ]

Please don't just take him to any old vet. When I said "a good reptile vet" I really meant just that. There are few reptile vets, fewer good ones, and extremely rare really good tortoise vets! If he seems to be improving, it may actually save his life to NOT take him to "the vet".

 

[mark1]

imo the type filter you have there is not enough ...... you need to grow as much nitrifying bacteria as possible .... to do that you need as much growing surface as you can possibly get , along with oxygen and warmth ....... using as many types of filtration in conjunction as you can in this limited space will get the best results ......... i believe most nitrifying bacteria is aerobic , i think bacteria that will grow in sand will be mostly anaerobic .......

 

[threeinoneshampoo]

Please don't just take him to any old vet. When I said "a good reptile vet" I really meant just that. There are few reptile vets, fewer good ones, and extremely rare really good tortoise vets! If he seems to be improving, it may actually save his life to NOT take him to "the vet".

Thank you for the help, I do live in the DMV area and there seem to be a lot of exotic practices that have specialized reptile vets here, but I will be careful and continue to monitor him He has gone 5 days at least without eating and I'm worried about him starving since baby turtles can only go a week or so without food. I might try a food bath for him or hand feeding (already looked into safe ways of doing both), but I haven't seen him swim yet today so keeping my fingers crossed that his bloating is gone.

 

[threeinoneshampoo]

He seems active but I don't really know what that looks like in a baby turtle. He spends the large majority of his time basking and napping and swims in the water for a minutes or so after 10-20 minutes of basking, and sleeps in the water at night. He swims pretty fast and has no problem climbing his way up the driftwood I put for him. He's also gotten a lot better at getting himself unstuck and flipping himself back over if he lands in the water upside down.

 

[threeinoneshampoo]

UPDATE:

Took him to the vet, he has the beginning of metabolic bone disease (shell is a little squishy) and pneumonia. He got diluted antibiotics and I was shown how to administer them to him every three days, he also got some liquid calcium and critical care that I need to syringe feed him every day. He weighs about 10 grams, and I'm going to keep tracking it every week. The vet said he's pretty strong despite this and it seems like there's a good chance that he'll survive.

 

[TammyJ]

Really hoping he pulls through.

 

[threeinoneshampoo]

Update, it's been a month and he's still floating and refusing to eat. He is starting to shed his scutes though and seems to be slightly bigger

 

[Paschendale52]

Thats good news! If he is shedding and growing he must be eating. Just when you arn't looking. Have you weighed him to see if he is more than 10g? One thing you can also do is take him out and bring him to a separate small container with some of his water with no decoration or anything just to put a couple pellets of food or strips of liver/fish whatever you're feeding. Basically just him and the food and not a whole lot of extra room. Leave him a few minutes so that he isn't nervous from you hovering over head, and then put him back in his normal tank after a few minutes. It will add some stress, so you may not want to bother if you can see him eat in his normal tank. But if you want want to be 100% sure whether or not he is eating you can do that.