Urgent Care :: Hatchling Floating

[robert7sass]

I have a hatchling about 4 months old. I have had 3 other hatchlings. This hatchling is with one other year-ling. Year-ling totally healthy, thriving. Hatching floats upside down often, cannot sub-merge at all, swims well, doesn't have puss from eyes or foam from the mouth. Basks a lot. Eats okay, however, have to feed separately, as the year-ling is a food hawk and does pretty much nothing but eat, bask, search for food- which is what my other older turtles did when they were hatchlings.

While I have 18 years turtle experience, I have only had one vet visit from all my turtles, and that was a decade ago.

Reading other posts, it appears this hatchling has pneumonia or a respiratory infection. Also, most forums state that even doing all the expensive vet stuff, will not guarantee a hatchling survives this. Outside of feeding it and keeping a warm basking area, and solid water temp, anything I can do for my turtle? Thanks.

[steve]

I would first keep them separate. He needs to be as stress free as possible in addition to developing an appetite and eat. Does he have any other symptoms?

[robert7sass]

No other symptoms. As a recap:

1. Eats in the morning, but can only float and swim on the surface, but can't submerge.
2. I have a 60 gallon aquarium, filled to the top, plexi-glass around the top where fish lights would be. Plexi-glass is a wall, hangling light. Thus, 60 gallon tank with 60 gallons of water. Turtle will not go past plastic top middle divider. Other side is the power filter, and hatchling cannot swim against that current.
3. Hatchling sleeps on exo-terra large dock, basks all day accept for mornign feeding.
4. Bottom of the shell is very soft, where sack used to be. This turtle is about 4 mos old. My other hatchlings, including my yearling in this same tank, swam easily to the bottom even as hatchlings.
5. Doesn't bask like the yearling. Yearling throws out all 4 extremities and elongates neck. Hatchling keeps all fours in the shell as it basks, head hardly out. To me, after 18 years of turtles, never seen this behavior or this floating issue.
6. Hatchling is NOT burping, or opening mouth to breathe. Thus, doesn't have that sign of respiratory illness.
7. If I take Hatchling by hand, set on the bottom (2 feet deep tank), floats up to top as soon as I let go. It would be impossible for hatchling to submerge, just can tell it is like a ton of air inside it, totally boyant, unlike all other turtles I have had.

My turtles have all been painteds for 18 years. Two females and one mail in another tank. One female and other male in that tank are over 2 decades old. They were caught in the wild when I was a kid. The other female is about 15, caught as a hatchling. She is the heaviest and strongest midland painted I have ever seen, held. Current two in 60 gallon tank, bought at Turtle Shack. To be honest, I have HUGE doubts about what I received. While the yearling is totally healthy, showed similar signs in the past, but did not last long. This hatchling is acting like it may die.

My one other vet experience a decade ago was with the male turtle. Tail bit in the back and opening healed shut. A very expensive surgery was done, and turtle is totally healthy today. I am scared to put several hundred bucks into a hatchling. Don't want the turtle to die, but scared I can sink a small fortune into it, and I may still be screwed. Thus, contemplating just taking it in and see. I live in a different state now than the last vet, very worried about finding a turtle vet here, though I live in Chicago area, I am sure there has to be one.

I guess as I have matured well into adulthood, I don't want to catch turtles in the wild anymore like when I was a kid. To be blunt, I caught 6 last summer, but I let them all go. Thus, I decided that I should ad all future turtles from the breeders online. I just have a bad feeling that it came sick, and the symptoms were there all along, just slowly got worse. I am considering going red ear slider as a mate for the yearling, (for sure if my hatchling dies.) I can buy sliders at the local pet store. Painted turtles are the wild turtles in my area, and I like their size. The foot long sliders need 150 gallons in my opinion, and I prefer two 60 gallon tanks in my house, not two 150 gallon, I have 4 kids, and they have space needs and pets of their own too.

Ihave gotten my two females to lay eggs, but never gave a serious effort to hatch them. I think I shall try it this year, with the incubators, etc. I don't want a litter of painted turtles though, just a couple more young ones. I have always had midland painted, but I went Southern painted with the Turtle Shack. I do not use substrate, keep it easy to clean and filter. I do use the Exo Terra floating duckweed, and lots of it. However, I use that only for the young turles as I have a fear the other ones may swallow it and then will have digestive track issues. I have removed the duckweed now, just because I have this fear maybe he swallowed a piece. (Doubt it for real though) Both turles basked much of the day, hunted for food, and hid in the duckweed, until of course this floating nonsense started.

Tomorrow night I will come home with the 15 buck 10 gallon tank to isolate the hatchling. The yearling loves the 60 gallon tank, and is a constant swimmer, food scavenger, and basker. That is all he/she does. The hatchling is most likely a male, he was temperature sexed. Other turtle I guess time will tell, I just felt "she" was a female. However, in honesty, as a kid I named my first hatchling Timothy, and well, a couple years later, she was really "Timmie." (A female.) I named the yearling "squirt" (my kids like Nemo the Disney Movie) I shall keep the hatchling in the 10 gallon take, with 10 galoons of water, make a top wall to keep them basked in, with a hanging light as usual. Outside of the duckweed (exo terra) now removed, and the exo terra turtle grass, I don't have any other good hiding spots. Before the hatchling could no longer fload, he would hide in the turtle grass. But now, can't even submerge.

[penelope]

Considering that my gal had an illness that by all intents and purposes should have killed her, I cringe when I hear about not wanting to endure all the "expensive vet stuff"
Understanding that your little one is only 4 months old, and having read how you invested in care in the past for an older turtle I do not feel you are ignorant regarding the need and cost of health care.
However, at minimum, I feel it is worth the money to see a vet and discuss if treatment or euthanasia is the best option. Stumbling upon a dead 4 month old is one thing, but if you know it is seriously ill and can/will die then maybe seeing a vet and not making him/her suffer is worth the cost.

[penelope]

PS. Regarding your desire to find a good vet at your new home. There are several members froim Chicago on here. Hopefully someone can help.
I truly send best wishes.

-lora-

[steve]

What and how much have you been feeding him?

[robert7sass]

Since my last post, I put him in a 10 gallon separate from all my other turtles. I then used a small water heater and heated the water at 75 instead of 70 (he is was a {Painted Turtle not a RES). I continued to feed him Tetra hatchling food. I began to research local vets. I did all of this on April 5th. He also died that day, within an hour of being placed in 75 degree water. Once I warmed the water up, he was "burping more", a lot more. Obviously, not really burping, but sign of a major sickness. I am pretty bothered with this turn of events. The warmer water (my other tank was kept at 70) brought about sideways floating, or slightly tilted to one side floating as well. Never having a floating turtle before, the lesson I learned is that once there is ANY sign of a respiratory Illness, you must go to the vet immediately.

On a side note, the yearling eats fish and lilly pads (from the pond my kids and I catch turtles in and let them go in), and the tetra food. I have some zoo med food too. I am starting to believe my yearling is a male, as the cloaca on "its" tail is moving past the shell. I also caught a yearling in the last couple of days at the pond with my daughter. (Not used to seeing them this awake in April, I guess the two weeks of 80 plus degree weather a month ago got them awake). This yearling (almost exactly the same size as my yearling has slightly shorter front nails and smaller tail. Obviously at a year, we are guessing. This turtle will be let go as the others. Not used to seeing painted turtles bask in April in mid 50s weather.

Back to the health issue, thank you so much everyone for all the help. On a side note, I have only caught one "sick" turtle out of several hundred in the wild (almost all returned to the wild). They are by far more healthy than hatchlings purchased from where I made my purchase. I have caught many hatchlings in my time, they are easy, by the shore typically. The "sick" wild turtle I caught last week. I "assume" it was sick, as it had algae all over its shell and back legs. I cleaned the algae off, kept her isolated, she ate lots of food, started to become relatively friendly and not scared of humans during basking.) But I let her go. I do not think algae is a sign of sickness necessarily, there was no shell rot, but I have never seen any other turtle in the surrounding lakes (or that one) like that. On even another note, I am annoyed someone dumped an adult snapping turtle in a drain near the lake. It had to be moved to a local river, as snapping turtles are not in the small lakes/ponds we turtle hunt in, but the slow moving rivers/creeks in the area, often where they come up on the roads. I know it is not from that pond area, I have known these lakes/ponds for 33 years or so. Never efver seen a snapping there, only painted. I hate it when turtles are let go in the wild that were not originally there, but I guess that is a topic for another thread/forum.

[penelope]

Can't undo time, but at least you got to see what listing looks like (sideways/tilted swimming) and witness the symptoms of of a serious RI.

Getting turtles from the wild is always risky (clarification: wild RES as in a place far from their natural habitat, like in the middle of the road). Beyond that I am a proponent of leaving them be and letting nature take its course.

Penelope came from the wild, sickness and all. So, all I can recommend is that if people want to snag a RES from the wild, they best be prepared for the financial investment including an immediate vet check up.

Not pointed at you - It breaks my heart when I hear a young person 'begging' for help because they can not afford a vet...only to find that they took the poor thing from its natural environment. They should have left them where they were if they couldn't afford the care.

It seems as if you have the common sense to let them return to their natural habitat before they become domesticated.

Totally agree with your snapping turtle story. It is quite frustrating. Unfortunately, we can not control the ignorant or uncaring

I'm sorry to hear about your little one, but glad you have added it to your "lessons learned" list. Trust me - my "lessons learned" list is very, very long.

Sending best wishes for the continuing health of your other little ones
preventative vet health check - hint hint