My tortoise's shell has translucent, thin borders in certain areas. Is this a sign of bad health?

Gandalf the Turtle

New Member
Joined
Nov 21, 2017
Messages
12
Location (City and/or State)
Netherlands
Hello there fellow humans!

I don't know whether this is normal, but my shell has some areas where the border is translucent; almost gelatin-like, and I don't know if this is normal. Does it mean I'm in bad health?

I eat greens every day. The only thing I don't eat are carrots (source of vitamin A) because I don't eat them (for whatever reason), tomatoes and other greens my human eats because I heard they're unhealthy for me.

I get bathed every few days, and my human tries to maintain the humidity of the table between 50% (when he's at work, he can't spray water in the tank so the humidity is lower) and 85%. I'd say the average humidity when he's at home is between 65% and 80%.

I'm a Hermann's tortoise born in 2016; I don't know my birthday, but I'm guessing I'm around a year old. Is the shell alright or am I suffering from some sort of issue my human isn't aware of?

Cheers,
Gandalf
IMG_3973.jpg IMG_3970.JPG IMG_3973.jpg
 

Gandalf the Turtle

New Member
Joined
Nov 21, 2017
Messages
12
Location (City and/or State)
Netherlands
Yes I'm also aware that my nails are long, but I don't like having them cut and my substrate is mainly dirt without many pebbles and whatnot. Also, the number on my shell was written by the stupid vendor who gave my human my adoption papers. My human does his best trying to gently scrub it off with every bath I take but so far I've barely noticed a difference.

Cheers!
 

Bee62

Well-Known Member
Joined
Nov 13, 2016
Messages
11,981
Location (City and/or State)
Germany
Hello Gandalf. You should not be worried about your shell. You are still young and growing and the transcendent edges of your shell is new grown shell.
Live long and happy, little tortoise.
 
Top