terra731993
Member
I purchased this little one, who I’ve named lucky, from a LLL Reptiles two days ago. I wasn’t planning on purchasing him/her (I’ll say him for the sake of keeping this simple) but he was in such bad shape.
1. His enclosure was extremely dry/ no humidity and when I asked if they ever soak them, the employee said they don’t have the time to.
2. There were mites crawling on him
3. Snake skin was in the enclosure with him which tells me they don’t clean them out in between animals.
4. He seemed to be missing scales on his head
5. There was sticky residue on his back from what looks like a square tag/sticker
6. then yesterday morning in the sunlight I noticed he has a deep cut on the side of his mouth (pictures included)
There’s luckily no wheezing or bubbles coming out of his nose so there’s one relief.
Im not one to start confrontation, so I figured it would be best to pay the $200 for him, take him home to soak him, calm down, and then contact the store when I could think a little more rationally. I’ve been giving him warm soaks and a humid enclosure where he has been digging himself a little hole. Has lots of energy so I’m not terribly worried about him, I’m pretty sure with the correct inclosure, soaks, and diet he will be back to normal but I didn’t go into this with much education on this species. I don’t even know a ballpark age for him and it seems travancore tortoises are a little more difficult to find information on unless I just haven’t been looking in the correct places. My focus has been on monitoring him and I haven’t been researching the same way I did before I got my other tortoises.
Those with this species, what should I begin doing? What is their diet like? How old does mine look?
I’ve also emailed the higher ups of the company and I’m currently waiting on a response. Thank you for reading this. The last few days have been stressful. I have pictures of how I found him in the store, dry and in the corner. I have also included pictures of his shell to show the sticker mark.
1. His enclosure was extremely dry/ no humidity and when I asked if they ever soak them, the employee said they don’t have the time to.
2. There were mites crawling on him
3. Snake skin was in the enclosure with him which tells me they don’t clean them out in between animals.
4. He seemed to be missing scales on his head
5. There was sticky residue on his back from what looks like a square tag/sticker
6. then yesterday morning in the sunlight I noticed he has a deep cut on the side of his mouth (pictures included)
There’s luckily no wheezing or bubbles coming out of his nose so there’s one relief.
Im not one to start confrontation, so I figured it would be best to pay the $200 for him, take him home to soak him, calm down, and then contact the store when I could think a little more rationally. I’ve been giving him warm soaks and a humid enclosure where he has been digging himself a little hole. Has lots of energy so I’m not terribly worried about him, I’m pretty sure with the correct inclosure, soaks, and diet he will be back to normal but I didn’t go into this with much education on this species. I don’t even know a ballpark age for him and it seems travancore tortoises are a little more difficult to find information on unless I just haven’t been looking in the correct places. My focus has been on monitoring him and I haven’t been researching the same way I did before I got my other tortoises.
Those with this species, what should I begin doing? What is their diet like? How old does mine look?
I’ve also emailed the higher ups of the company and I’m currently waiting on a response. Thank you for reading this. The last few days have been stressful. I have pictures of how I found him in the store, dry and in the corner. I have also included pictures of his shell to show the sticker mark.
