Sulcata dragging hind leg

badkitty

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I have a 10 year old male sulcata tortoise, he's 22inches long about 100 pounds.
Just recently he started dragging his left hind leg.
He is still eating/drinking as he normally would. Diet is backyard grass/weeds and dark leafy greens. I spray him with water and soak the yard daily, he has a water hole but refuses to soak in it.
I've turned him over and didn't see anything visibly wrong with it. Nothing in the yard that he could of hurt it on .
Could it be something with his joints /dehydration or something more serious?
Thanks in advance
 

wellington

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@Yvonne G might be able to help here. It's really hard to say what it could be. I'm sure lots of things are possible. Hopefully it's nothing big. Keep us posted though.
 

eric joranson

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Is it housed or have any contact with other sulcatas? Is there something he could have climbed on and tumbled off? Is there any swelling of the leg affected? Wasps; bees; fire ants or scorpions found in the area?
 

badkitty

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Is it housed or have any contact with other sulcatas? Is there something he could have climbed on and tumbled off? Is there any swelling of the leg affected? Wasps; bees; fire ants or scorpions found in the area?
No swelling at all, he has full run of the yard. We have other sucatas but they don't mess him him since he's the biggest.Theres nothing in the yard I can think of. No bees/wasps no scorpions.
He does like to hump everything in sight even rocks lol so that's the only thing I can think of him hurting it.
 

Joe Ragman

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I had a sulcata about the same age but a little smaller and he quit eating and wasn't as active as he normally would be. I took him to our vet at the time and he took him home with him for observation since he couldn't find anything wrong with him. After a few days the vets wife noticed him walking a little funny and they had found a tennis ball up in his leg socket and was pushing on his intestines. After they removed it, the tortoise ended up passing away within a day.
So you might check to see if something similar might have happened.
 

ZEROPILOT

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I had a sulcata about the same age but a little smaller and he quit eating and wasn't as active as he normally would be. I took him to our vet at the time and he took him home with him for observation since he couldn't find anything wrong with him. After a few days the vets wife noticed him walking a little funny and they had found a tennis ball up in his leg socket and was pushing on his intestines. After they removed it, the tortoise ended up passing away within a day.
So you might check to see if something similar might have happened.
A tumor? A Stone?
 

Yvonne G

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It sounds to me like he may have a pretty large bladder stone. The stones sometimes press on the nerves and it affects their back legs. I think an X-ray is in order.
 

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