Torty McFly

LoutheRussian

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5 Year Member
Joined
Mar 17, 2014
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Cornelius Or
Torty McFly



I’ve had Torty McFly for about three months now and I have always struggled with getting him to eat or have any kind of energy. It seemed as though he had no interest in food at all no matter what it was. After much frustration, emailing a local exotic vet and consulting people with much more experience than I have I think I have finally worked out what was going on... I think. I adopted Torty from a woman who, from what I was told, got him from an elderly woman who’s daughter convinced her to relinquish him as she was unable to care for him anymore. I was told he was kept as a classroom pet and that he is 16 years old. The lady said she had him vet checked, that he has no parasites, no worms and that he had his beak checked and that no trimming was needed. When I first got him I saw him make a few attempts at taking a bite of food but struggled to pick it up. None of my other torts have had that problem so I thought maybe his beak was the issue. I had never trimmed one before so I went to trust ol YouTube Didna little research and I began trimming a little off the sides of the upper beak. That’s when I noticed that his lower mandible is split in two. Each half of his lower jaw is independent of the other. Since he had lived this long and from everything I’ve been told about his eating habits I kind of wrote it off as no big deal. That couldn’t be why he wasn’t eating because the new growth made it look like it had been that way for a while. Then one day I just started noticing that he would constantly put his face really close to the ground as though he was smelling the ground every few steps. I thought this is kind of odd and after watching him a little bit more I realize he wasn’t smelling the earth he was looking to see where he was going. I did a really close look up into his eyes and noticed that the left one seem to be permanently dazing off in a random direction. The right eye seems to be able to work normally but his left eye seems to be looking out sideways towards his shell. If that makes any sense at all. I don’t know for sure but I assume that this would be something similar to a person being cross eyed. I began to add all the things up such as it may not recognize what I’m giving him his food since I am feeding him differently then the woman who had him previous, he can’t see where he’s going or what he’s eating, his upper beak was so thick he couldn’t get his mouth onto the food and when he did it wouldn’t cut through like normal. Not only that it seems as though he almost lacks the natural instinct to use his front legs to eat. I have to hand feed him and when he takes a bite that would require him to put his front leg on it and pull off a piece he will instead only pull his head back into his shell. And to top it all off he was battling a slight URI when I got him. I listened to his breathing when I went to pick him up but I somehow missed the clicks in his breathing. It’s been a very educational yet frustrating first few month with Torty but now that I seem to have cracked the code with him and got him eating on a regular basis he has much more energy and has started to show his own personality. I found a spot on his neck he likes scratched and he loves it when I scrub his shell lightly during bath time. Just the other day he started to actually want to eat instead of me having to gently encourage him to open his mouth and take a bite. I apologize for such a long rant but after everything I’ve gone through with him so far I needed to unload and I’ve tried telling this to my friends and family and even though they listen they don’t really understand or care about my tortoises eating habits or lack there of. I know that this community will at least understand how good it feels to know that I feel like I can now provide him with the level of care he deserves. I still can’t figure out how he split his lower jaw though. My best guess is that since he was a classroom tortoise maybe a naughty little **** got ahold of him and hurt him.
 

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