Indian Star Baby help

[jenifour13]

Hello! SO happy to have found this group.

A little more than a month ago I agreed to my husband getting a tortoise. Low and behold, this little Indian Star Tortoise comes into my life and I'm obsessed. We were told he was 10 months old. My husband built him a lovely tortoise table and we have researched and adjusted the lighting and heat to a fault. My problem is, his one eye always seems to be harder for him to open. We did a carrot soak and he seemed ok. He had been eating since we got him without a problem. Then about a week ago he just stopped eating. He spends most of his time asleep in a warmer spot of his habitat. I have read he might be too hot, too cold, ok, not ok. I'm at a loss. We were soaking him everyday but cut back to once every few days now. When he soaks he moves around and even walks around in his habitat for a little bit but them goes back to sleep. I know that Indian Stars don't hibernate but could he be reacting to the cold weather outside, even if we are keeping it stable in here? I'm worried about the little guy.

TIA for any help!

 

[Markw84]

Its hard to say for certain without more information about how your tortoise is being kept. However, I see no way possible to keep an open table style enclosure with the right conditions for an Indian star, and particularly for a baby or young star. They need temperatures that never drop below 80° and humidity that never drops below 90% to thrive. There is no way for an open table enclosure to provide that unless the whole room the enclosure is in is kept at those parameters. The conditions you are describing your tortoise is displaying is quite indicative of temperature and humidity too low.

If you could post some pictures of the enclosure and the types of lighting and heating used along with the 4 important temperatures (ambient, basking, min nighttime, coolest corner) we can give ideas for you.

Also please read through the care sheets in the star section of the forum and come back with any questions.

How to raise a Healthy Star Tortoise.

Stars, Leopards, and Sulcata tortoises are almost identical in care requirements, especially their first few years to get them started properly and thriving. These tortoises, their first few years, will fail to thrive and be active, unless you provide proper heat, humidity, and light. Leopard...

www.tortoiseforum.org

The Best Way To Raise A Sulcata, Leopard, Or Star Tortoise

I chose the title of this care sheet very carefully. Are there other ways to raise babies? Yes. Yes there are, but those ways are not as good. What follows is the BEST way, according to 30 years of research and experimentation with hundreds of babies of many species. Babies hatch during the...

www.tortoiseforum.org