Undigested Food in Poo

[abyrhianl]

Hi we have a leopard tortoise, we’ve had him for around a month now and believe he’s roughly 1 year old (100g, 7.8cm SCL). We’ve been feeding him on a diet of mostly grass with a variety of safe weeds mixed in but he appears to be struggling to digest the grass and it’s coming out in long strands in his poo, I’ve tried cutting it up but nothing seems to change this. What could we do to stop this? Is he to young for grass? We were old as a grazing species 70-80% of his diet should be grasses and hay? Thank you in advance for any advice/information [emoji217]

 

[daniellenc]

Is he too cold or the grass not cut up small enough? I keep red foots but I would suspect temps and size of clippings. @Tom would be helpful.

 

[abyrhianl]

Is he too cold or the grass not cut up small enough? I keep red foots but I would suspect temps and size of clippings. @Tom would be helpful.

His temperatures are all correct, I’ll try cutting up even smaller, thanks [emoji1360]

 

[Tom]

Hi we have a leopard tortoise, we’ve had him for around a month now and believe he’s roughly 1 year old (100g, 7.8cm SCL). We’ve been feeding him on a diet of mostly grass with a variety of safe weeds mixed in but he appears to be struggling to digest the grass and it’s coming out in long strands in his poo, I’ve tried cutting it up but nothing seems to change this. What could we do to stop this? Is he to young for grass? We were old as a grazing species 70-80% of his diet should be grasses and hay? Thank you in advance for any advice/information [emoji217]

Regular leopards are often not that fond of grass, and it is normal for all species to not completely digest the grass. I chop it into small pieces for little tortoises. I only use freshly sprouted soft young grass for baby tortoises and I chop it into pieces smaller than 1 inch.

For your tortoise at this age, I would make grass only about 10% of the diet. There is no scientific study to back this up. This is just my opinion on the matter based on my years of experience.

 

[Kapidolo Farms]

So, that's what long fiber is. Good job on diet. Long fiber helps tortoises pass food along their digestive track. The little "torso" movement that helps many animals do the same thing is restricted in tortoises, so that long fiber gives the smooth muscles that move food along a substrate to work with. Otherwise it's all squishy stuff and it sits in their digestive track for less suitable amount of time. The weight gain you have noticed over the time you have had the tortoise is also a compelling story that the diet is good. If you reduce the grass amount but increase broad-leaf items you will still be getting long fiber, but perhaps more digestible.

When you see a partially decomposed leaf in your garden and all the veins are shown, that too is long fiber and serves the same purpose, but it is more difficult to see in a poop. I've washed some poops to see how much of that comes through when mulberry leaf is fed at a high proportion of the diet, and you can see all those little leaf veins.

Good job on the diet.

 

[abyrhianl]

So, that's what long fiber is. Good job on diet. Long fiber helps tortoises pass food along their digestive track. The little "torso" movement that helps many animals do the same thing is restricted in tortoises, so that long fiber gives the smooth muscles that move food along a substrate to work with. Otherwise it's all squishy stuff and it sits in their digestive track for less suitable amount of time. The weight gain you have noticed over the time you have had the tortoise is also a compelling story that the diet is good. If you reduce the grass amount but increase broad-leaf items you will still be getting long fiber, but perhaps more digestible.

When you see a partially decomposed leaf in your garden and all the veins are shown, that too is long fiber and serves the same purpose, but it is more difficult to see in a poop. I've washed some poops to see how much of that comes through when mulberry leaf is fed at a high proportion of the diet, and you can see all those little leaf veins.

Good job on the diet.

Okay, so a small development this evening is that his has been asleep all day then when put in this bath his was drinking water for several minutes and moving very slow, he has grass/fibres coming out of his bottom (no poo around it) we have soaked him for around 30 minutes (second soak today). Could this be a blocked bowl? What can we do to solve this? We’re very worried about him, he’s gained roughly 2-3 grams in the month we’ve had him. Thanks

 

[Jay Bagley]

Hi we have a leopard tortoise, we’ve had him for around a month now and believe he’s roughly 1 year old (100g, 7.8cm SCL). We’ve been feeding him on a diet of mostly grass with a variety of safe weeds mixed in but he appears to be struggling to digest the grass and it’s coming out in long strands in his poo, I’ve tried cutting it up but nothing seems to change this. What could we do to stop this? Is he to young for grass? We were old as a grazing species 70-80% of his diet should be grasses and hay? Thank you in advance for any advice/information [emoji217]

I'm very glad you posted this. My sulcata sometimes has bits and pieces of partially undigested grass in his stool as well. I got my answer without even having to create a post. Thank you

 

[Kapidolo Farms]

Okay, so a small development this evening is that his has been asleep all day then when put in this bath his was drinking water for several minutes and moving very slow, he has grass/fibres coming out of his bottom (no poo around it) we have soaked him for around 30 minutes (second soak today). Could this be a blocked bowl? What can we do to solve this? We’re very worried about him, he’s gained roughly 2-3 grams in the month we’ve had him. Thanks

I'm not fully sure regarding blockage. Some times I forget to take one particular leo out of his soak water (a single kept animal in a sorta weird set-up). The water is shallow, so it just means he is in the water overnight. The water tray is in his enclosure so the temps are good. Instead of the normal single well formed poop, it's like a hippo was in there, lots and lots of poop.