Tortoise Penis or Possible Cloacal?

[Esmerelda]

Good morning, good afternoon and good evening fellow tortoise parents.

I was away this morning and when I came home I was informed that my baby tortoise who is 20 months - 6 and a half inches long, was having a very weird poop.

I was bathing her yesterday and she was face down, butt up trying to poop. She let a 2 inch poop through. No signs of the bulge we saw today.
Though today, she was face down butt up again, from what i've been told she had a small pea sized and egg shaped bulge coming from her tail (about the length of her tail) - while she was going to the bathroom. As she pushed, the bulge would come out and once she was done it would retract, this happened for the full length of her poop. She had a very large poop today. She was put in a bath immediately after showing the bulge and it went in. I have checked multiple times since i've been home to see if I can get it back out by putting small pressure on her tail but it hasn't worked.

She has great living conditions, she is fed properly; The only changes I've made is I have given her zucchini a few times this week for the first time, and she has out grown her old hide and it has been replaced with a new one. Also, she's been a lot more active lately - by active she's been moving all of her things around and trying to escape.

Though I did notice she hadn't had a bowel movement for approx 5 days.

I'm curious if this is normal, if she is really a he, and mostly I'm concerned there may be something more severely wrong with her. This is the first instance this has happened and when I look up "Tortoise Penis" these do not seem to match the description of the bulge.

Attached are pictures of her tail, and of her cuteness as well.

 

[Yvonne G]

You should probably feed the tortoise more wet food to help reduce the size of those large poops. Straining to get out the hard, large poops causes tissue to be pushed out too. Not a good thing. Feed some aloe or cucumber for a few days to soften and moisten the feces, then start adding more moist foods on a regular basis. Do you allow a 15 or 20 minute soak daily?

 

[Esmerelda]

I never even thought of that

I have been soaking her but it usually just twice a week. With this in mind I will start soaking her a lot more regularly and add more moist foods to her diet.

Thank you for the advice! Esmerelda and I are very thankful!

 

[Esmerelda]

You should probably feed the tortoise more wet food to help reduce the size of those large poops. Straining to get out the hard, large poops causes tissue to be pushed out too. Not a good thing. Feed some aloe or cucumber for a few days to soften and moisten the feces, then start adding more moist foods on a regular basis. Do you allow a 15 or 20 minute soak daily?

She says she loves cucumber and she's so happy to have fellow tortoise parents helping her out.

 

[Yvonne G]

It might be a better idea to mix the cuke in with the greens so the tortoise doesn't only eat the cuke.

 

[Kasia]

Good morning, good afternoon and good evening fellow tortoise parents.

I was away this morning and when I came home I was informed that my baby tortoise who is 20 months - 6 and a half inches long, was having a very weird poop.

I was bathing her yesterday and she was face down, butt up trying to poop. She let a 2 inch poop through. No signs of the bulge we saw today.
Though today, she was face down butt up again, from what i've been told she had a small pea sized and egg shaped bulge coming from her tail (about the length of her tail) - while she was going to the bathroom. As she pushed, the bulge would come out and once she was done it would retract, this happened for the full length of her poop. She had a very large poop today. She was put in a bath immediately after showing the bulge and it went in. I have checked multiple times since i've been home to see if I can get it back out by putting small pressure on her tail but it hasn't worked.

She has great living conditions, she is fed properly; The only changes I've made is I have given her zucchini a few times this week for the first time, and she has out grown her old hide and it has been replaced with a new one. Also, she's been a lot more active lately - by active she's been moving all of her things around and trying to escape.

Though I did notice she hadn't had a bowel movement for approx 5 days.

I'm curious if this is normal, if she is really a he, and mostly I'm concerned there may be something more severely wrong with her. This is the first instance this has happened and when I look up "Tortoise Penis" these do not seem to match the description of the bulge.

Attached are pictures of her tail, and of her cuteness as well.

I've noticed the same thing recently with my Nini (560 g of leopard tortoise), pinkish stuff out of went during pooping. She poops twice a week during soakes. I starded soaking on daily basis but made food less moist (she does not eat lot of grass and dry things mostly freash weeds, spring mix, kale, radish leaves... ) e.g. included dried plantain, hay. I thought that providing more cellulose in the same volume will make it easier to eliminate and she won't strain that much. What do You think, will it help???

 

[tinkerbell1189]

I noticed that too with my tort and wasn't sure what it was, but then one day he 'flashed' me and I knew for sure then my "female" was most definitely a male!