Photo Gallery :: B.C. and her ongoing recovery from shell rot.

[soopermum62]

I rescued BC from my local pet store. We Brought her home on 12/26/2004. The Pet store owner asked me to take her because she was ill and had shell rot..
Dates on the pictures are accurate. Do not try to treat a turtle with shell rot by yourself. I was in constant contact with 3 professional turtle keepers all the way through the worst of her recovery.
These first 4 pictures are very large and were taken within minutes of my getting her home.

[jenaero]

Looks like she's lucky she found you! I can't believe anyone would let her get that bad without treating her good save!!!

[soopermum62]

As you can see, she was in pretty rough shape.. She needed intervention and needed it now!

First thing I did was to give her a good bath with Nolvasan solution (you can get it online and from vets). I scrubbed all that white junk off her shell (BTW it was "VitaShell" which should never be used to heal the shell from this type of problem.. in fact it made the problem worse.)

I then peeled very carefully all the very loose stuff away.. I wiped her down with Betadine solution and dry tanked her for an hour, and then coated her in Bacitracin ointment.
Then I got ahold of my professionals. They told me to Trim the bad loose sections away. Imagine my horror! They told me as long as I couldn't see innards or make her bleed, I was doing okay. And they told me to only trim what would come off easily. Well that wasn't enough for me so I found a turtle shell anatomy page.

Here is the link to that page scroll down to the section that says "Anatomy of a turtle shell"

http://zygote.swarthmore.edu/turtle.html

Now between what my professionals were telling me and actual understanding of the turtle shell, I proceeded to cut away the bad portions of her shell. Both the inner dermal layer and the epidermal layer.
Believe it or not she held very still for this. Now I had the Carapace almost done. I then gave her a wipe down with Betadine solution and put her in a dry tank and let the Betadine work. I then coated her in Bacitracin oinment and placed her in her dry tank for the night.
(All said and done she was dry tanked for almost 6 weeks.)

She got nightly rehydration baths and feedings.
She also got wormed.

I could only put her in water up to her peripheral scutes as I had not started on her plastron yet.
After I had her about a week, I started on her plastron and the peripheral scutes..When I first got her I thought she was going septic (blood poisoning) but as I had treated her Carapace the redness seemed to be leaving her plastron. She was just as bad there with the loose shell and again held very still.
It took me about 2 weeks to get her trimmed back to halfway decent shell. (note I said halfway decent, Not Good!)

I had gotten discouraged and sent another set of pictures off to my professionals. (next post)

My professionals had me switch over to "Silvadine" oinment..(perscription only) It is less greasy so the skin can breathe, and seem to stick to the ectodermal layer very well.
I gave her a low piece of slate to "bask" on and put the heat lamp over that. She also had an UVB bulb.. she had a low dish (superseal lid) for drinking.
I continued the nightly scrubs with Nolvasan and trimming of the dead loose shell then recoating her Carapace with silvadine ointment. I kept using Bacitracin on her plastron because I wanted to seal out bacteria.



Continued....

[soopermum62]

next set of pictures.

[soopermum62]

and the next set..

[da sAUCE!]

it feels great to save animals! you are a hero!

[marisa]

Wow Soopermum--I think this is worse that I had imagined from your description on the old forum. Not to be gross, but am wondering--how much of an odor there was with all the rot.

[soopermum62]

It was stomach turning disgusting..
I'll have more pictures up in a day or so.
These pictures are only showing the first chunks of shell I took off.
She has very little keratin layer left..
She will be over a year in getting her shell back.. her shell is 85-95%% ectodermal layer only.
It is a miracle that she is alive.. she was also very light (I never did weigh her)
I fed her as much as she would eat of reptomin daily for a month.
She also got vegetables and cuttle bone, which she didn't eat until she went back in a more normal RES tank habitat... (more on that later)
I wanted her to gain weight rapidly especially with the amount of stress she was under being dry tanked. I also felt if she had the calories & nutirents she would pull through better..
I was putting so much antibiotic ointment on her it was like a hanging on to a greased pig when I would put her back in the the dry tank or take her out!
If I hadn't seen as much improvement in her as I did in such a short space of time, she would of been to the vet for antibiotic shots.

[marisa]

So she never was septic? That was lucky. BTW, what does B.C. stand for and why did you change her name from Myrtle?

[soopermum62]

B.C. Stands for Baby Cakes. I change any animal's name that I rescue, It gives them a new identity to cling to and a clean break from their old life.

As far as I know she wasn't septic. She is doing great now.. if you look real close at my Avatar you will see that B.C. is the turtle in the foreground of the picture.

[soopermum62]

I'll add some more pictures now.. Ask questions if you have them...
These ones are a bit blurry..
sorry..






And here how she looks Now....
By herself


Basking with Speedy and Squirt (she is standing on Speedy)
Yes I know that is a Whole LOTTA Turtle in that tank....
But they get along!


What a difference eh..
I'll get some close ups just so you can see how much has been peeled away and you can tell how much better she actually is..

[marisa]

Big improvement! BTW, nice idea about the new name, fresh start (hard to believe whoever had her even bothered to give her a name the way she was treated, though).

[steve]

great job... i like the little stacking photo. keep us updated

[DOOMSTACHE]

So, does this mean that my RES's shell will go back to its intended color? Because right now he's pretty much gray.

[DOOMSTACHE]

wow its almost been a year since you posted new pics. do you have any?