Maggie needs help

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dmmj

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emysemys said:
If you don't have any, I'll send you some.
I feel sorry for that postal employee. :)
 

LittleTurtles

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emysemys said:
I think I may have an inkling...

This is "Hospital Girl." Which means she has been in the hospital habitat for a long enough time that it now became her name. Which means she may have been on antibiotics off and on for quite a while. Which means maybe her gut flora and fauna are cleaned out. Do you have another tortoise of the same specie that you know for a fact is clean and free of disease? It might help Hospital Girl if she could eat the feces from a clean animal. If you don't have any, I'll send you some.

I have to agree with this.... Im not a tortoise expert by any means, but normally an animal eating nonfood things is a sign that they are lacking something.... I know that the gut flora and fauna are essential for torts and turtles and if these have been "neutralized" then she wont be able to process food the same... this could lead to her trying to put things in her stomach that give her the "full" feeling or simply trying to get her body back on track (just going off what I know about dogs, my pitbull was an avid rock eater when she was a pup, vet had us switch her food to a lower protein brand for a few months and she stopped)
 

Vegasarah

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I am by no means an expert on torts, but I have many years experience with other reptiles. I have a blue tongue lizard that did the same thing, eating substrate and rocks and sticks. She was on antibiotics for an injury, and my vet told me that it might be killing all the good bacteria in her gut as well as the bad. She was eating the substrate to balance herself out. I got her a supplement with live cultures and also put a cuttle bone in for her to sort of chew on and it worked. She stopped eating the naughty things!
 

Tom

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Hmm... Looks like we may be on to something...
 

Talka

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Wow, so the solution is for your tortoise to eat poop!
 

chairman

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A little late to the party, but my first thought was to try birdseed as a substrate like you would with uros. If not edible then it should at least pass. Guess the only concerns would be whether the seed would go bad or sprout if it got wet/damp, and whether it could be packed well enough to avoid splay leg problems. But hopefully the poo idea makes creative substrate solutions unnecessary.
 
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Maggie Cummings

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OK Yvonne, I'll be looking for poop in the mail. Hahaha, how funny we are to say that and talk about poop in all seriousness....
 

Madkins007

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Healthy poop, supplements with 'probiotics' or active culture yogurt should all work about the same- all contain the intestinal flora you are looking for to counteract the antibiotics. I know I have seen yogurt 'pellets' somewhere for purposes like this- was it at the pet store?
 

Angi

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Wow I can't believe I missed this, as I am having almost the same problem. My guys are not eating stuff in their indoor enclosure just the new out door one.

Good luck Maggie!
 

lovelyrosepetal

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What happened with Hospital Girl? Is she better? Did the poop work? I am riveted by your dilemma and hope that everything worked out for you with her.:)
 

*Barracuda_50*

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My 2 cents worth get her off the crappy Baytril it can cause more harm then good especialy if given for long periods of time, give her a rest from the antibiotics and i totaly agree a good essential probiotic would be very helpful, if shes not to quick to chew cuttle bone give her a Zoo Med tort block, chunk/shave some of it off one end leave that laying on a flat cap/plastic lid with the rest of the block with it. If shes been on antibiotics long term her system is pretty well beatin down from it, sickness/pathogens/ect ect ect can and will get resistent to one type antibiotic/meds. Shes not only tryng to eat things to replace whats missing in her diet per say vitamins minerals nutrients but shes eating things that have color/the shape/size or look apealing to her as she cant smell or taste them due to pluged nose and loss of taste senses/receptor due to being sick and meds breaking that down. Thats just my 2 cents worth, but i would deffinetly change mode of medical care, try foods that more mimic color wise what she has been eating thats not good for her.
 
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