My turtle has been getting black spots all over his skin and shell for the past year. I have taken him to an "exotic vet" TWICE (who said he was perfectly healthy and fine
), spoken with a reptile rehabilitator extensively, and no one knows what is wrong with him.He shows absolutely no other symptoms. He is active, his water is fine, his diet is fine (veggies plus either San Francisco Bay Frozen Turtle Diet, Fluker's mealworms, or Fluker's crickets once or twice a week), and I use an MVB bulb (I change it every six months.) He has a 100 gallon aquarium with a large basking area where he can get totally dry.
His skin is so mottled with black spots that his red "ears" have turned a sickly pink and are hardly noticeable anymore. The top of his shell is also very dark, and his yellow underside has small black spots. These black spots do not fit the description of shell rot or any fungal/bacterial infection. They only appear to be a color change-- they're not inflamed or full of pus or anything weird. He's not sensitive about them, either.
He has had difficulty shedding since he reached adulthood, but had a complete shed last August (2011).
It sounds like a vitamin or mineral deficiency of some kind, but I have no idea how to find out what it is, or what the hell to do about it. The vet was useless, the zoo won't help me, the reptile rehabilitator doesn't seem to know, and I cannot find any information about it on the internet anywhere.
