Domestic Turtle Calendar

Any experienced keeper, veterinarian and turtle.ru forum member will tell you that every year the same events occur in the turtle world related to the health, behavior of turtles and themselves in people’s lives.

January

People celebrate the New Year, there are few reports of turtles.

February

Overfed turtles are brought to the veterinarians. The owners wanted to pamper their pets with New Year’s dishes and constipation, swelling are not long in coming.

March, April

Turtles with kidney failure are brought to the veterinarians, who supposedly hibernated at a temperature of 20-23 degrees in November-December. Refusal to eat for a month, does not wake up, swollen legs / neck / head, does not leave the house – typical complaints of this period. If we calculate that the so-called hibernation began in November, and people come in March, then in 5-6 months we have a fully formed “chronicle”.

May

Turtles are starting to die, in which symptoms of CRF are found. Virtually no one survives, even with intensive care.
The first pregnant females are brought to the veterinarians. And sometimes supposedly males come, complaining of restlessness, digging, refusing to eat! It’s all about x-rays.
On the street, they find the first Central Asian turtles lost during walks, discarded (because they are tired) red-eared turtles, and left in search of love and laying eggs of marsh turtles.
The first seasonal smuggled Central Asian turtles from allied Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan appear on the Bird Market…

June July August

Terrestrial tortoises lost and found in the country and during walks continue. There are not many finds. Almost all of them were bitten by dogs, with dislocated limbs, etc.
The wave “we bought a pygmy turtle on vacation, but it doesn’t eat something” begins until September. Naive vacationers are bred to buy red-eared turtles with tympanum, because sellers stuff them exclusively with dry gammarus, which is of no use. Some turtles are also sick with bacterial infections, fungus, pneumonia. Only half of the babies sold survive, and even they do not always please their newfound owners with the fact that they will soon grow from a plate.
Summer is the time for walking around the apartment or in the country. As well as the time of losses and fractures. Those turtles whose owners release their pets on the floor, climb under sofas, furniture, risk getting a fracture. They are stepped on, pressed, pressed. Periodically, a turtle is brought to the veterinarians, which went to the balcony and fell out of it. Not everyone can be saved.
From vacations from Astrakhan, fishermen bring swamp turtles in large numbers, for some reason often considering them land turtles, and as a result, reptiles suffer from dehydration and hunger, since they cannot eat grass alone.
Brought or found marsh females lay eggs, sometimes they even succeed in incubating them. There are people and small marsh turtles.
Also from vacations from Krasnodar they bring found or bought Mediterranean tortoises of Nikolsky, which are in the Red Book of the Russian Federation.

September

In September, a new wave of overfeeding comes, because. some try to stuff as much grass and dandelions as possible into the turtle while they’re still there.

October November

This is the heating start time. While it is turned on, people will freeze to death, and cold-blooded reptiles simply become inactive. Even when living in a heated terrarium. They feel climate change very well and sleep more.
When the heating is turned on, another danger appears – dryness. For you and me, this is a period of respiratory diseases due to dryness of the nasopharynx, and for land reptiles, this is the path to dehydration. Therefore, do not neglect frequent bathing in winter.

December

Everyone is waiting for the New Year. As a gift, someone chooses a turtle. A turtle bought from hands on the market is almost a XNUMX% carrier of herpesvirosis. In winter it is cold outside, the sellers do not heat the terrariums. There are not very many herpetic turtles. Because when you just took a turtle, it is not yet clear that something is wrong with it. Therefore, January is a rather calm month.