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Hello everyone,

Yesterday, I received my new female RES hatchling in the mail. When I first took her out of her package and examined her, I immediately noticed that her eyes were sunken in and I could see her undereye socket, which made me assume that she is either dehydrated or starving. Her shipping process took two days, so I am not sure if that was enough time for her to become dehydrated. I currently have her in a small carrier with water and a bit of gravel. I haven't put her in the tank yet because I have another slightly larger hatchling in there already that wasn't so welcoming towards the new baby when I put her in there today. I checked her eyes again today and they still look sunken in (kind of creepy looking, if you ask me ). If she is in fact dehydrated, what can I do to nurse her back to health as soon as possible? She's just a little baby and I know she is very delicate at this stage in life so I want to do whatever I can to keep her nice and healthy.

Thank you,
-Meli

First, you probably shouldn't order turtles online often. If you do, be sure to get them from a reputable breeder. Where did you get yours from?

You might want to take her to a vet, but I'm not that sure. Can you take a picture of the turtle?

I ordered her from myturtlestore.com . I will take a picture of her right now and attach it. I now know that she is definitely dehydrated because now her eyes are swollen shut. I just want her back to health because I feel guilty for not ordering cool packs to keep her hydrated for her trip. However, it looks like the company put a cool pack in her container for shipment anyway so I am not sure why she is dehydrated after only 2 days shipping. Is having her in water (as she should be anyway) not enough to rehydrate her? I know it isn't just as easy as having a couple gulps of water and being back healthy, I just don't know what else there is to do. I just did a small vision test and she is still motion responsive for the most part, but I know she cannot see very well at all.

Thanks for the help so far.

I would recommend taking her to a vet.

I went ahead and did some research and found that MyTurtleStore is basically turtleshack [not reputable], an old company that had a pretty bad reputation. I wound recommend buying them from a different place next time.

Yes, I definitely will not be buying anything from them again unless it is some kind of care product perhaps. This makes me question the living condition that the company's live inventory inhabits because I find it hard to believe that this turtle became this dehydrated just from a 2 day trip. I will take her to a vet tomorrow morning and see what they have to say. Hopefully there is an easy remedy that I can do myself or a treatment that they can give her that doesn't cost me an arm and a leg. I feel so terrible whenever I see her; I just hope she isn't suffering too much from this.
Thank you again for your help!

Though 2 days is not a long time, the conditions of her travel could have caused a lot of problems. Try some cod liver oil on the eyelids and try soaking her in a small container with 1:1 water and Pedialyte.

Thank you so much for the advice! I ended up keeping her in a small carrier until her eyes stabilized. She is happy and healthy now and gets along just fine with her tank mate. I will definitely try the pedialyte method if any issues ever arise again.