I can't do it anymore

[PalestTortie]

As the title says.

This is 5th time in 2 weeks, it's 06:34 as of writing THIS rn. This is a very recent thing.

She just completely freaks out, running around with her head in, making these hissing sounds, banging the shell in very tank like manner (pushes everything away from her way), and tons of scratching in one spot.

I don't know why she's doing this. Sadly though, if I won't be able to find the root cause of these freak shows, then I'm going to have to get rid of her.

So, her humidity is kept around 80%, it's 75% rn. 12% UVB (Arcadia brand), I use ExoTerra Intense 75 Watts for her heating spot? Which is being kept 34 Celsius during the day. She's going to be 2 years old next month, and one year will pass since I got her blah blah blah blah!

I want to know why she doing this or she going

 

[The_Four_Toed_Edward]

You mean scratching the enclosure or herself?

Is there some sort of routine to this or does it happen randomly?

The first thing that comes to my mind is fire ants. If a tortoise gets bitten by fire ants, it is common for them to try to run away.

 

[PalestTortie]

You mean scratching the enclosure or herself?

Is there some sort of routine to this or does it happen randomly?

The first thing that comes to my mind is fire ants. If a tortoise gets bitten by fire ants, it is common for them to try to run away.

She literally panics, that's what I've said. She just hisses while running around her vivarium banging on walls

It happens randomly, and this was the 5th time this happened in past 2 weeks

No fire ants. I'm in UK and she ain't outside

 

[Alex and the Redfoot]

What is heating lightning schedule? Are there vibration/low frequency noise/strong smell sources nearby?

Such behaviour is pretty uncommon...

Can you post an overall enclosure photo (haven't found one in older threads)?

 

[The_Four_Toed_Edward]

Forgot to ask, when did this start?

 

[Littleredfootbigredheart]

I hope we can figure out the route cause because I fear if there’s something underlying she’ll be doing this in a new home too

The only thing I’d probably change is the intense basking bulb for an Arcadia floodlight, try and make sure it’s reaching 95f just directly under that bulb.

How high is your uv mounted? Have you tried turning it off for a few days up to a week or two to see if that’s the problem? Sometimes some bulbs have a stronger output, that could be bothering her if so

A enclosure pic would be good

 

[Littleredfootbigredheart]

What kind of ambient lighting do you use? How long do you have uv on for?

 

[RandyTortoise]

What kind of tortoise is it? Did you change anything in her enclosure recently? Something is definitely bothering her, either externally (lights, ants or environment) or she has a medical problem like an infection or pain. Tortoises have medical issues as well. No animal is free from similar inflictions that we suffer from, we are all living beings.
Don’t give up, take her to a vet and slowly investigate to see how you can help her. She need help not annoyance. I know it is hard bet we get these animals to care for them and it is our responsibility to help them and not just think, hey, if she doesn’t stop, I am getting rid of her. You didn’t do that to your grandmother right?

 

[PalestTortie]

Please, most respectfully, read the post as many times as you can because I get questions already answered in the post.

It was 6:34am as of starting to write the post, her lights and heating come on at 7am until 7pm. I use Arcadia's LED light for ambient light. UVB is on for 6 hours a day, 3 hours after lights on, 3 hours before lights off. As I was recommended in older posts.

There are no photos of the enclosure, no, it hasn't changed since I got her. Orchid bark (worst substrate ever recommended to me), flexi stick hut for her, cuttlefish bone for calcium, shallow plate under heat lamp (else she won't soak herself in water) and a flat rock in the middle. Not the greatest, but will start improving the set up soon. Even more soon if she actually stops freaking the hecc out cause she won't be given away

And I'll say this again, yes this is a new thing she started doing. Today was the 5th time in 2 weeks. This came out of nowhere, so I don't know what on earth is going on

 

[Yvonne G]

Maybe the enclosure is too small and she's upset, trying to get away. You never mentioned what species the tortoise is. Would it be possible to make an outdoor enclosure for the tortoise?

 

[Tom]

As the title says.

This is 5th time in 2 weeks, it's 06:34 as of writing THIS rn. This is a very recent thing.

She just completely freaks out, running around with her head in, making these hissing sounds, banging the shell in very tank like manner (pushes everything away from her way), and tons of scratching in one spot.

I don't know why she's doing this. Sadly though, if I won't be able to find the root cause of these freak shows, then I'm going to have to get rid of her.

So, her humidity is kept around 80%, it's 75% rn. 12% UVB (Arcadia brand), I use ExoTerra Intense 75 Watts for her heating spot? Which is being kept 34 Celsius during the day. She's going to be 2 years old next month, and one year will pass since I got her blah blah blah blah!

I want to know why she doing this or she going

What species of tortoise and what size? Age doesn't tell us the size.
What size enclosure?
How high over the tortoise is the UV tube mounted?

You have the wrong type of basking bulb, but that would not cause this issue. It will just cause pyramiding if the tortoise is still growing. Incandescent flood type bulbs should be used for basking. Arcadia sells these.

What you describe sounds like something is hurting the tortoise. If you were using a cfl type UV bulb, I would suspect that. The tortoise is exhibiting a reaction to something painful.

What is wrong with the orchid bark? It is literally the best substrate there is. Why is it the worst substrate ever recommended?

Pictures of the enclosure and tortoise are very likely to give us insight into helping you discover and correct the problem.

 

[PalestTortie]

Maybe the enclosure is too small and she's upset, trying to get away. You never mentioned what species the tortoise is. Would it be possible to make an outdoor enclosure for the tortoise?

Yeah at 6:30am this is surely important to her as she sleeps then wakes up panicking.
She's a greek baby, sorry I didn't mention this.

We don't have a garden.

 

[PalestTortie]

What species of tortoise and what size? Age doesn't tell us the size.
What size enclosure?
How high over the tortoise is the UV tube mounted?

You have the wrong type of basking bulb, but that would not cause this issue. It will just cause pyramiding if the tortoise is still growing. Incandescent flood type bulbs should be used for basking. Arcadia sells these.

What you describe sounds like something is hurting the tortoise. If you were using a cfl type UV bulb, I would suspect that. The tortoise is exhibiting a reaction to something painful.

What is wrong with the orchid bark? It is literally the best substrate there is. Why is it the worst substrate ever recommended?

Pictures of the enclosure and tortoise are very likely to give us insight into helping you discover and correct the problem.

UVB is 16-18" away from tortoise. She fits on my palm still, but is starting to outgrow it.

5x2x2 feet vivarium.

The lamp isn't bad, used it for a year and her shell is still smooth.

What would hurt her? I don't use any CFL, the UVB is t5 long lamp.

Worst substrate ever, I hope new tortoise owners won't be buying it. Poop, food go down it and eventually break apart making it difficult to clean, and this only rots there. Moisture and water only make this worse, plus it caused so much fungus deeper into the layer and there is so many fungus gnats.

I wish I listened to myself instead of forum people that exaggarate some of the things (no disrespect meant, past trauma here basically) and gotten Arcadia's Earth Mix Arid instead.

And there, pic of the enclosure as I have already described. It hasn't changed at all since I got her

Forums are the main reason I avoid talking to other pet owners, always abrasive, condescending, exaggerating and quick to attack and say you keep the animal wrong but not say what and why. I'm just desperate to know why she's doing this, if not, the ultimatum is that I will find her a home and get a berber skink instead eventually

 

[zovick]

UVB is 16-18" away from tortoise. She fits on my palm still, but is starting to outgrow it.

5x2x2 feet vivarium.

The lamp isn't bad, used it for a year and her shell is still smooth.

What would hurt her? I don't use any CFL, the UVB is t5 long lamp.

Worst substrate ever, I hope new tortoise owners won't be buying it. Poop, food go down it and eventually break apart making it difficult to clean, and this only rots there. Moisture and water only make this worse, plus it caused so much fungus deeper into the layer and there is so many fungus gnats.

I wish I listened to myself instead of forum people that exaggarate some of the things (no disrespect meant, past trauma here basically) and gotten Arcadia's Earth Mix Arid instead.

And there, pic of the enclosure as I have already described. It hasn't changed at all since I got her

Forums are the main reason I avoid talking to other pet owners, always abrasive, condescending, exaggerating and quick to attack and say you keep the animal wrong but not say what and why. I'm just desperate to know why she's doing this, if not, the ultimatum is that I will find her a home and get a berber skink instead eventually

Maybe putting a few plants in there would help. It might be that the tortoise is beginning to feel too "exposed" and wants more places to hang out in the shade other than just the one hide. Mine always loved sitting under the overhanging leaves or branches of various plants and small shrubs.

 

[Littleredfootbigredheart]

Please, most respectfully, read the post as many times as you can because I get questions already answered in the post.

It was 6:34am as of starting to write the post, her lights and heating come on at 7am until 7pm. I use Arcadia's LED light for ambient light. UVB is on for 6 hours a day, 3 hours after lights on, 3 hours before lights off. As I was recommended in older posts.

There are no photos of the enclosure, no, it hasn't changed since I got her. Orchid bark (worst substrate ever recommended to me), flexi stick hut for her, cuttlefish bone for calcium, shallow plate under heat lamp (else she won't soak herself in water) and a flat rock in the middle. Not the greatest, but will start improving the set up soon. Even more soon if she actually stops freaking the hecc out cause she won't be given away

And I'll say this again, yes this is a new thing she started doing. Today was the 5th time in 2 weeks. This came out of nowhere, so I don't know what on earth is going on

16 inches would be a little too close, 18-20 is preferred for the Arcadia ProT5, if you haven’t tried keeping it off for a week or so, I’d give it a go, whilst the quality of their products is the best, there’s always the chance for outliers, yours could have a much stronger output which would be uncomfortable at 16”, there’s not really any knowing for definite without a solar meter.
4hours daily should suffice instead of 6, but I’d try turning it off altogether for a bit.

Worst substrate ever, I hope new tortoise owners won't be buying it. Poop, food go down it and eventually break apart making it difficult to clean, and this only rots there. Moisture and water only make this worse, plus it caused so much fungus deeper into the layer and there is so many fungus gnats.

I wish I listened to myself instead of forum people that exaggarate some of the things (no disrespect meant, past trauma here basically) and gotten Arcadia's Earth Mix Arid instead.

I can vouch personally and through countless members that orchid bark is definitely the best substrate, any poop or food you see needs to be spot cleaned daily, or it will indeed break down and mould. Moisture wise, I’d recommend mixing your substrate at least once a week, if there’s standing water or excessive moisture at the bottom, then again you will run into issues, orchid bark can’t rot/mould, it’s any organic matter that’s been missed that will cause mould, when maintained properly it’s the best and safest substrate option there is.

The earth mix you’re referring to often contains sand, which causes its own issues, also you can’t get away from the fact that the substrate needs to be moist, with those kind of mixes you’re going to end up with mud that will stick to everything, if you really want a soil like substrate, coco coir is a safer option, but again this will likely be even messier than the orchid bark.

The lamp isn't bad, used it for a year and her shell is still smooth.

You won’t truly see the damage it causes until she gets a bit bigger, she still looks too small to notice any significant pyramiding, but I can see in the photo she definitely has some starting

Forums are the main reason I avoid talking to other pet owners, always abrasive, condescending, exaggerating and quick to attack and say you keep the animal wrong but not say what and why. I'm just desperate to know why she's doing this, if not, the ultimatum is that I will find her a home and get a berber skink instead eventually

I can’t speak for other pet forums, but on here yes people do have different styles of typing, perhaps some come across abrupt, but there’s plenty of lovely friendly people on here as well as those who just give you the information you need, some people like it dressed up a bit more but not every member is going to take the time to do that, their priority is getting the info to you. I can safely say no one on here will tell you your set up is wrong without giving further individual points on why, and how to improve things, you’ve been given some potential reasons already.

I’m not usually as direct with people myself on here, but I don’t have any respect for the notion of ‘if I can’t figure it out, I’m going to replace her with a new pet’, how does that solve her issue? When you decided to get a tortoise, you took on the responsibility every pet owner should take, to make sure their pet is healthy and comfortable, if you run into behavioural problems, you get to the bottom of it at any cost and fix it, not pass the problem on to the next person.

It sounds more like to me you don’t want a tortoise anymore and want a skink instead, if that’s the case then she’d probably be better off in a new home, but don’t use the excuse of her behavioural issues, if you truly wanted her you wouldn’t have this ultimatum in the first place, that’s such a crazy concept to all us tortoise lovers here, I don’t know how you expected that to be received well on a tortoise forum.

What you going to do if your new skink starts presenting with health issues with no obvious causes? Replace it with a gecko?

 

[RandyTortoise]

16 inches would be a little too close, 18-20 is preferred for the Arcadia ProT5, if you haven’t tried keeping it off for a week or so, I’d give it a go, whilst the quality of their products is the best, there’s always the chance for outliers, yours could have a much stronger output which would be uncomfortable at 16”, there’s not really any knowing for definite without a solar meter.
4hours daily should suffice instead of 6, but I’d try turning it off altogether for a bit.


I can vouch personally and through countless members that orchid bark is definitely the best substrate, any poop or food you see needs to be spot cleaned daily, or it will indeed break down and mould. Moisture wise, I’d recommend mixing your substrate at least once a week, if there’s standing water or excessive moisture at the bottom, then again you will run into issues, orchid bark can’t rot/mould, it’s any organic matter that’s been missed that will cause mould, when maintained properly it’s the best and safest substrate option there is.

The earth mix you’re referring to often contains sand, which causes its own issues, also you can’t get away from the fact that the substrate needs to be moist, with those kind of mixes you’re going to end up with mud that will stick to everything, if you really want a soil like substrate, coco coir is a safer option, but again this will likely be even messier than the orchid bark.


You won’t truly see the damage it causes until she gets a bit bigger, she still looks too small to notice any significant pyramiding, but I can see in the photo she definitely has some starting


I can’t speak for other pet forums, but on here yes people do have different styles of typing, perhaps some come across abrupt, but there’s plenty of lovely friendly people on here as well as those who just give you the information you need, some people like it dressed up a bit more but not every member is going to take the time to do that, their priority is getting the info to you. I can safely say no one on here will tell you your set up is wrong without giving further individual points on why, and how to improve things, you’ve been given some potential reasons already.

I’m not usually as direct with people myself on here, but I don’t have any respect for the notion of ‘if I can’t figure it out, I’m going to replace her with a new pet’, how does that solve her issue? When you decided to get a tortoise, you took on the responsibility every pet owner should take, to make sure their pet is healthy and comfortable, if you run into behavioural problems, you get to the bottom of it at any cost and fix it, not pass the problem on to the next person.

It sounds more like to me you don’t want a tortoise anymore and want a skink instead, if that’s the case then she’d probably be better off in a new home, but don’t use the excuse of her behavioural issues, if you truly wanted her you wouldn’t have this ultimatum in the first place, that’s such a crazy concept to all us tortoise lovers here, I don’t know how you expected that to be received well on a tortoise forum.

What you going to do if your new skink starts presenting with health issues with no obvious causes? Replace it with a gecko?

Completely agree.

 

[Anastasia 22]

I am not an expert but could the glass be a problem? She can see through it and she tries go through it....

 

[Littleredfootbigredheart]

I am not an expert but could the glass be a problem? She can see through it and she tries go through it....

A lot of people have debunked this being an issue, but personally I think a visual barrier on glass doesn’t hurt, we have one in case

 

[Alex and the Redfoot]

Please, most respectfully, read the post as many times as you can because I get questions already answered in the post.

It was 6:34am as of starting to write the post, her lights and heating come on at 7am until 7pm. I use Arcadia's LED light for ambient light. UVB is on for 6 hours a day, 3 hours after lights on, 3 hours before lights off. As I was recommended in older posts.

There are no photos of the enclosure, no, it hasn't changed since I got her. Orchid bark (worst substrate ever recommended to me), flexi stick hut for her, cuttlefish bone for calcium, shallow plate under heat lamp (else she won't soak herself in water) and a flat rock in the middle. Not the greatest, but will start improving the set up soon. Even more soon if she actually stops freaking the hecc out cause she won't be given away

And I'll say this again, yes this is a new thing she started doing. Today was the 5th time in 2 weeks. This came out of nowhere, so I don't know what on earth is going on

As it is summer now, she might expect longer photoperiod and seek a basking spot. You can adjust basking lamp timer to switch on at 6.30AM. Some more hiding spots and shaded areas could also help (a good point by zovick).

 

[PalestTortie]

Maybe putting a few plants in there would help. It might be that the tortoise is beginning to feel too "exposed" and wants more places to hang out in the shade other than just the one hide. Mine always loved sitting under the overhanging leaves or branches of various plants and small shrubs.

I dunno, I expect she'd already be acting like this if that were the case tbh.

16 inches would be a little too close, 18-20 is preferred for the Arcadia ProT5, if you haven’t tried keeping it off for a week or so, I’d give it a go, whilst the quality of their products is the best, there’s always the chance for outliers, yours could have a much stronger output which would be uncomfortable at 16”, there’s not really any knowing for definite without a solar meter.
4hours daily should suffice instead of 6, but I’d try turning it off altogether for a bit.

I have measured the distance, it is between 18-20", so not worried about this.

Why would I even cut it off for a week? My anxiety is crippling as is, and I would hate to gamble with her health. Let alone this "panic attack" episode

I can’t speak for other pet forums, but on here yes people do have different styles of typing, perhaps some come across abrupt, but there’s plenty of lovely friendly people on here as well as those who just give you the information you need, some people like it dressed up a bit more but not every member is going to take the time to do that, their priority is getting the info to you. I can safely say no one on here will tell you your set up is wrong without giving further individual points on why, and how to improve things, you’ve been given some potential reasons already.

I’m not usually as direct with people myself on here, but I don’t have any respect for the notion of ‘if I can’t figure it out, I’m going to replace her with a new pet’, how does that solve her issue? When you decided to get a tortoise, you took on the responsibility every pet owner should take, to make sure their pet is healthy and comfortable, if you run into behavioural problems, you get to the bottom of it at any cost and fix it, not pass the problem on to the next person.

It sounds more like to me you don’t want a tortoise anymore and want a skink instead, if that’s the case then she’d probably be better off in a new home, but don’t use the excuse of her behavioural issues, if you truly wanted her you wouldn’t have this ultimatum in the first place, that’s such a crazy concept to all us tortoise lovers here, I don’t know how you expected that to be received well on a tortoise forum.

What you going to do if your new skink starts presenting with health issues with no obvious causes? Replace it with a gecko?

I do understand and agree with you here, it's not the best thing, but I'm talking in case I won't be able to find the root cause.

I will call the shop I got her from, I'll try hitting up a zoo, a vet to see if they have any ideas.

Isn't there a chance she could be dreaming? Like bad dreams, kind of nightmares? I'm out of ideas~