shelldon slider turtle

Question
QUESTION:
back in
april, I found a slider hit by a car.  He is about 7 inches long.  I asked about his car and chances of survival because of his injuries.  His shell was broken in three places, his left eye was bashed into his head, his other eye was swollen and he was bleeding.  I'm happy to say, 2months later, he is still alive and seems to be impriving slowly,  I had been advised thru this website to feed his greens and keep him out of the water 20hrs aday and increase water time as his health and injuries hreal.  He also spits mucus ,not as often or bloody as it use to be,every feww days.  Recently, I read that juviniles like to eat protein so about 2 weeks ago I started feding him boiled chicken, tuna, brisket and recently earth worms all of which he gobbles up.  My concern is he has not had a bowl movement in a week.  Is this normal?  Because he is able to pull himself completly out of the water, I put him in a dry container during the nite and shut the uvb lampoff till morning.  When weather permints, lately I have set up a habitat in a kiddy pool outside so he can swim and receive natural uvb. What else should I be doing, I know a little more now  but I really don't know anything about sliders. Right now Shelldon spends about 12 hrs under uvb light  in and out of the water.     Thanks for your advise.    

         Gina Causey

ANSWER: The diet that was advised was "Diet during this time should be simple and very digestable. 'Soft pellets' would be best- but wild turtles rarely eat it. Try fish food like worms, shrimp, krill, and beef heart, or dark leafy greens (lightly cook to help them sink in the water a bit.)"

At 7", it is not a young or small turtle so the diet would be about 1/2-3/4 meats, the rest veggies- mostly dark leafy greens. A sudden change in diet can be a problem, especially if greens were dropped. Brisket is also rather fatty- the meats should be the sorts of foods you would feed fish.

By now, we would hope that he can be in the water most of the time. Keep the water filtration up (in an indoor pool), and only take it out once a day for a good swabbing with the Betadine. Let it dry for a few hours and return it to the water.

The bloody mucus still worries me- it is a sign of lung injuries and I cannot think o anything to recommend for it.

Otherwise, it sounds like things are going pretty well. Give http://www.austinsturtlepage.com a look for other ideas.



---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: I forgot yo add one more thing, Shelldon is not able to submerge in the water.  When there is food at the bottom, I have to guide him under water so he can grab the food.  As a result, When he is feeding, the water is no more than a couple of inches deep,so hecan stretch his neck out to ffed or I place his food on a submerged rock within his reach.
         Gina
ANSWER: That sounds like the lungs as well- You may want to see if a vet can ofer him an antibiotic or something.

He must have been pretty banged up inside, but sounds like he is doing not too badly otherwise!

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: Mark,  Yes you did send me the info on repairing the shell, but I had already used super glue and carpet tape  and was was advised by someone at the pet shop not to remove it since it might do more damage trying to pull it off.  It seems to be holding up preety well.  There is no more open, exposed flesh anywhere, there is one part of his shell where there is a slight gap, part of it is under the tape and part exposed,the part that is exposed is staarting to fuse.  He is able to open and close his damaged eye now and the other eye seems to be ok although there are days when it seems a little more bugged.,but no visible signs of reddness or discoloration.  My earlier question , should I just feed him greens until I see a bowl movement?  Still no signs of it.          Thanks again gina

Answer
As far as the diet, just greens is not real healthy for a 7" turtle, but neither is just meat. Offer it a selection and let it choose what it wants. If all it eats is the greens, great! As long as it is his choice.




I hate to say this, but the pet shop was mistaken. The chemicals in the carpet tape and the mechanical action of it on the shell has possibly delayed healing and allowed other things to happen that we don't want to happen, including trapping germs inside. The tape really has to come off- the sooner the better.

Give him a good long soak (overnight would be good) in warm water and gently tease off as much as you can. Use nail polish remover and Q-tips to remove as much of the adhesive as possible, working in small patches and rinsing the chemicals off well after a patch is cleared. Make yourself a little 'chisel' but cutting a wooden Q-tip shaft off at an angle with heavy scissors or something and use that to scrape/chisel stuff off as well.

"Wrap'em tight and let them heal" techniques like what was suggested can end up with results ranging from wonderful- clean, perfect healing- to terrible- gangrene, infection, etc- and everything in between. If you have good, clean, healthy shell under it- great!

If not, gently but firmly scrape or scrub off as much of the damaged shell as possible and evaluate.

In either case, give the newly exposed shell a good general scrubbing to remove any remaining chemical or adhesive residue and give the turtle a good evaluation.





Overall, he sounds like he is doing AMAZINGLY well for you- you should be proud of your results! Congratulations!