today we're going to be looking at how
to treat shell rot in turtles
[Music]
so shell rot is something that can
happen in turtles most often in
semi-aquatic turtles and unfortunately
it's somewhat common even though it can
be avoided it usually happens when a
turtle doesn't get the proper heating or
basking areas that they need so that
they can actually dry out their shell so
what ends up happening is their shell
basically just starts rotting away it
can be really dangerous if it gets to a
certain point but luckily it's not too
difficult to treat it just takes a bit
of time and patience to do it so i have
a 10 and a half year old red ear slider
named franklin i got him about six
months ago and the previous owners never
really gave him the proper basking or
heating that he needed so he did develop
a lot of shell rot
mainly on the top of the shell near his
head you can see the before right here
all of that discolored white area is
what started to rot away and then
afterwards now he's looking like this
and that was after about two to three
weeks of treating it he does have one
tiny spot that i'll be using uh to show
you how to treat it today and like i
said it's not too difficult but you do
need a couple supplies chances are
you're going to have a lot of this stuff
already however you might need to buy
this important ingredient and you're
going to need something
that can kill those germs more
specifically it should be either
betadine or what i'm using
po-fidone
iodine both of these work just fine but
the provident iodine has worked well for
me in addition to that you're going to
need just some paper towels you might
want a glove to avoid getting the stuff
on you you're going to need some sort of
mild soap that isn't going to irritate
the turtle and you're going to want a
toothbrush this toothbrush should not
have been previously used you don't want
to give the turtle human germs and
obviously this isn't a toothbrush you
should use later because you don't want
the turtle germs in addition to this
we'll need access to a sink so we're
going to go over to that now so right
here we've got our turtle and i'll be
treating this very white area right here
today the first thing you want to do is
simply wash the turtle and remove
anything like any dirt
any algae and things that won't
necessarily hurt it but you want to
remove those things so that you can
really cleanse the actual shell rot and
get that fixed so what i do is i take a
little bit of that mild soap
and then just rub it onto the area now
the hardest part is keeping your turtle
uh in an actual grip
and not dropping it while you're doing
this but i have a wet toothbrush and i'm
going to try and just firmly clean this
area
cleaning the area that your turtle
has that shell rot again the soap simply
removes anything that might be in the
way of actually fixing that shell rod
really make sure you get in every little
crack in between every little scoot
to make sure you get anything out that
can be there next i'm going to go ahead
and stick them under the sink and rinse
off all of this soap do your best to
keep everything out of the turtle's face
because you definitely don't want to
irritate your turtle or get anything in
its eyes so you should do everything
downwards and try and hold this turtle
at this position whenever you can i'm
going to rinse the toothbrush off and
give it a scrub just with water to make
sure all that soap is out of there
he's the troll is getting a little
slippery now
that he is wet so you got to be extra
careful to make sure you always have a
grip you might even want a second person
to hold the turtle while you do this so
now that spot is clean i'm going to take
some paper towel you can probably just
use a napkin or a towel or whatever but
keep in mind the betadine or the
puffidone iodine is going to stain
anything it touches and it does not come
out i can guarantee you so i'll just dry
this whole area off it really doesn't
need to be too dry but you don't want
any standing water that's going to get
in the way of the bacteria killing stuff
once the turtle's basically dry you can
go ahead and get ready to add this
chemical i'm going to go ahead and just
drip a little bit of this out
make sure you're aware of how fast it
comes out
i might even just use my finger of
course you're going to need to wash your
hands real well after this i'm just
going to make sure i cover that whole
area and everything around it i might
add just a couple more drops it really
shouldn't take more than like five or
ten drops probably and now you've got
that all covered with the iodine you can
really just kind of rub it to make sure
it gets into all the cracks what this is
going to do is kill any bacteria that's
eating away at the shell
so that it'll stop eating away the shell
and begin to heal itself so now that
everything's on there what you really
need to do is just make sure this is
able to get dry you definitely shouldn't
put your turtle back in the water yet
you're probably going to want to let it
sit out for 10 to 20 minutes is best
just as long as possible until you know
that this has gotten time to absorb and
soak in and it's all good to go usually
i'd let him run around on the carpet
however this will definitely stain the
carpet if any drips off so i'm just
going to keep them up on some dry areas
that cannot get stained remember to
clean everything up and wash your hands
after
this shouldn't hurt you since it can be
used with people too but you obviously
don't want to ingest it or anything
so i kind of lied i went ahead and let
him hang out on the carpet nothing
should drip at this point and he's just
kind of walking around and i'm gonna let
that air out for a good few minutes so
it's been about 15 minutes now and as
you can see nothing is coming off
everything is dry right there so that's
good to go and now he can go back into
his enclosure and that's really all you
need to do it's best if you do this
daily try and not miss any days but do
it daily for a couple weeks and it
should start fixing or be nearly
completely healed by the end of those
few weeks if it still goes for like past
a month then you might want to go check
out an exotic vet or something because
it really shouldn't take too long so
that's the process i followed to treat a
ton of shell rot on the top of franklin
right here and i'll be doing the same on
the back in this spot but that'd be it
for this video hopefully it helps out
let me know if you know any other tips
to help others in the comments on
treating shell rot but that'll be it for
this video i'm alex and thanks for
watching
[Music]
you