Urgent Care

For the past 3 days my female turtle Maria has been bitting herself and making noises whenever she does it. The noise sounds almost like a choking or gagging noise. I’m not sure if she’s making the noise because she’s in pain whenever she bites herself or what. I have also seen her yawn two times in a row yesterday and once today.She’s about 3 years old and a rescue turtle that I got about 2 months ago. She has also been shedding non stop ever since I got her. Additionally her shell does not look the greatest either or her skin colors. Her skin and shell are a greyish color. Additionally on her shell she has many white/ silvery spots. She was seen at a vet about a month and a half ago. The vet said she had dry skin and wasn’t too sure about whether she had shell rot but to be safe she put her on daily antibiotics for 10 days. She did not believe that Maria had a skin fungal infection and told me to do a soak of Shed-Ease once a week. If anyone could give me some advice to help her stop bitting herself and how to help her shell and skin that would be great.

The skin shedding looks normal to me in these pictures. My female would oft bite herself (her arms, of course) when basking, and sometimes she's make this odd light crunch or squawking sound (for lack of a better description). This should all be fine.

Her shell looks alright from the pictures as well. The scales there shed as well, but they change first and start looking like how they look in your picture. Are you using a proper UV bulb?

Yes, I have a basking light and UVB light. Whenever I got her she never had any type of lights. Whenever I got her lights her shell completely shed and that’s whenever I took her to the vet to make sure it wasn’t shell rot. That was about almost a month and a half ago. Would you think she would be about to shed again so quickly?

Also the skin shedding has been happening since I got her. I wasn’t sure if it was normal for her to be shedding for such a long period of time.

For her shell loosing scales again so soon, yes it can happen. If her shell wasn't loosing scales before, it's possible there's a few "layers" that may come off. Generally through the life of my turtle, she usually loses scales in the spring and fall, but this has never been a hard and fast rule.

For skin shedding, again, that's completely normal.

Thank you! I’ve been pretty worrisome since I got her since she wasn’t being kept properly.

Urgent Care :: Turtle bitting herself while basking, yawning, making noises

Who is online