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Hi all..i just joined this forum..i got two RES turtles...but finding it hard in India to get some useful information about how to keep them healthy...i keep them in small baby bathtub..prepared basking area with river pebbles..made arrangement for filter and heater [temp 30-32 degree Celsius]..didn't find UV lamps anywhere, made arrangement for incandescent bulb to maintain the heat atleast..daily keep them in direct sunlight for couple of hours..but in monsoon weather will be mostly cloudy...so i keep them out of water everyday for at least an hour to get them dry..feed them with turtle food and amazon swords live plant..

but from 2-3 wks i see one of them is having white patches on shell..consulted a vet..he said it is skin infection...so everyday i am cleaning its shell with a baby brush and applying betadine solution and drydocking for an hour..giving multivitamin syrup and ampicillin[very less] directly in water for 3 days continuously weekly or in every 10 days..i thought it will cure the infection and vitamin will boost its digestive system...initially it shown improvement..but now don't know why the condition is deteriorating..and it grew weak..now it hardly opens its eyes..can anyone suggest an eye drop?? sometimes i feel it has got respiratory infection...because it opens its mouth very often as it is trying to catch some air..

i am very confused..can anyone suggest what to do??..also attaching a pic of it so that anyone can identify whether its infection or something else...please help..

You need a uvb lamp and basking dock and everything that meets what it needs. If not, thing like this will happen. Also, they eye thing is because he is in the water too much.

Thanks Alexis...in India its hard to find UVB lamp or proper basking dock....if i dry dock them in direct sunlight for longer won't that help? for eyes if i put cod liver oil will it help?? please suggest...as i am not getting the exact things we require...i am forced to think of alternatives...

You can get a tub or small pool set it outside for the day and put a piece of floating log so it can bask. Then at night, bring it inside to sleep then the next day put it outside again. You can try to do that to his eye. I had the exact same problem but I made a setup and put water condition in. Maybe that helped it.

that's great alex...i'll try that

applying betadine will be fine on infected areas??shall i put concentrated or diluted?

this simple setup i hv made wid available things...

The white areas on the shell is fungus. Have they been eating?

the infected one has reduced food intake...and less active...the other one is active and eating properly...

Would you be able to get some silver sulfadiazine cream?

ya but i checked for it's review...according to wikipedia it isn't good..so i am thinking of applying candid b cream and powder..it actually dries out the surface so that fungus doesn't get enough moisture to grow..let's see if it works.. am more worried about it's eating..if it doesn't get enough energy to fight these treatments will not work..what if i mix few drops of aquarium antifungal solution in the water? will that affect their health condition?

steve..consulted a vet..i am using candid b cream...gvn a gentle massage on shell with this cream n keeping it fr half n hr n thn wipe it off with a cotton...it works...also gvn a drop twice a day to boost up its immunity...n sporidex 2drops twice a day..its a mild antibiotic to cure RI..hv to continue for a wk...let's see wht happens...

I'm not familiar with Candid B, good luck with the treatment.