How much stress can these guys take?

[duckie68]

Hi everyone - I have a question because I'm just worried for my yet to arrive new baby. I'm rehoming a male who is around 5-7 years old and the distance between where he is now and where I live is about 5 or so hours with GOOD driving conditions. Being all the way up in Canada in the winter - need I say more that good driving conditions are few and far between. The original plan was a friend who has a good winter driving vehicle was going to pick him up for me when she did her already planned road trip going right by the town he is at right now. Her husband decided to postpone the trip for a couple of weeks when he came down with a bad case of the sniffles the night before - and he is the one who does the driving so all hands were tied.

Then the lady who has this little tort right now had an idea of coming down my way herself to visit friends here and that way she could drop off the tortoise with me and everyone's happy. After going along fine for a few hours in the car an unexpected thing happened to the vehicle and she is stuck at the bus station with no means to drive. She has the poor little guy in his traveling container but that's IT. He has been out of his enclosure since 9:00am this morning and probably won't be able to be put back into a temporary rubbermaid container until 6:00pm tonight!

I'm so concerned for this little guy I am almost beside myself with worry. Having 4 other reptiles in the house I am aware of how stress can affect their immune system and I'm worried this whole fiasco today is stressing him out badly. Then to top it off next weekend he will get loaded into a car all over again for when my friend will be doing her road trip and has the ability to pick him up for me - so he barely will have a chance to recover from the mess he's going through today before he gets to do be stuck in a container in a moving car for 6 or 7 hours all over again.

My question to everyone is - will all this stress on him from today and then next weekend be too much for him? As far as I know (or I should say have been told by his current keeper) he is healthy and fine. I just don't want to see him go through all this only to end up in the end with a sick tortoise from being way too stressed out over it all. What is everyone's experience with stressed out russians?

Thanks for any help

[shellietort]

I don't know much about raising RT's.  I have had mine for about 8 months and I had a really hard time getting used to taking care of her with lots of trial and errors and much help from this forum.   However, I did want to encourage you somewhat with the experience I had with getting mine home.   I live in Michigan and my tort came from Louisiana.   My daughter brought him to me via automobile in May.   They were on the road for 2 days.   I worried about the car being air conditioned (its hot in Louisiana in May) or else getting too hot while they were in a restaurant.  I worried about everything, and if that wasn't enough, I didn't know how to take care of her once she got here.   She must have a really good imune system because she has survived and is thriving.   She thinks she owns the place now, and I'm not sure she doesn't.  I hope this is helpful and I am sure someone who knows a whole lot more than I do can give you sound advise.
Mary

[duckie68]

Wow, thanks for replying and letting me know your experience Mary. I hope my Scuttle will be just as fine with it as your little one was.

I just hate putting any animal through so much stress. I was expecting to have him here tonight with me getting himself settled into his new home, but unfortunate circumstances derailed the plans. Had my own vehicle been able to handle the white out conditions going through the mountain passes I would have had him here 2 weeks ago. Its almost like this whole rehoming him has been cursed right from the get go, but I'm so looking forward to providing this guy with a home so I don't want to give up.

Hopefully next weekend around this time I can update and say he took it all in stride and is grumpily hiding away while getting over the long car ride in his new big enclosure.

I only have 2 words to say regarding all of this : WINTER SUCKS!

[russianuncle]

Please do update us. I'm getting concerned myself. Don't want to see the tort out of a arm car for more than 16 seconds! I know in a small container provided by stor, "my" RT calmed down after about 20 minutes of the 35 minute August ride in an A/C-ed car to be arrive in an 80 degree-ish day. Seemed most freaked out at seeing my face after her new owner held her up to me (perhaps my beard reminded her of her capturer if she as wild caught from the Afgan region.) She certainly had no problem with me shortly thereafter and other than the love of digging/hiding, became well adjusted and is pretty relaxed. You never know what they went thru in transit. At least here you know the ride may be ling but no abuse will be done-also, one member told me once that in transit keeping something like a child's blanket to "dig themselves" into mekes them feel secure. Of course the tipping over avoidance is key, thus sometimes a small looking container may be safe if someone cannot monitor whether or not your's stays on it's feet.

[duckie68]

Yes I will update once I finally get my little guy home. I got an email from the lady who has him now and he took the fiasco in stride. He seemed a bit grumpy and moping while they were still on the road but once they got back home he seemed ok. She said he spent the next day just sleeping most of the day (I hope that's not a bad sign)

The weather here is getting really bad so this weekend may even end up being a no-go. My friend only has snow tires on the vehicle and once they get up into the pass they may get stopped and forced to turn around because they don't have chains. I'm almost giving up hope.....almost. I'm still at the point where stubbornness wins and I am determined to get this guy here.

Might just book a bus ticket up there by the weekend if my friend can't drive up.

[russianuncle]

hopefully you don't have to wait outside for the bus on the way back

[ashross77]

Now THATS dedication!
Ash

[Eunice]

Hope all goes well and you get him safe and sound.  What part of Canada do you live in?  I live in Windsor On.
Eunice

[duckie68]

I'm in the greater vancouver district of BC. We are (murphy's law) getting hit with some pretty nasty winter weather right now which has been one of the reasons getting him picked up has been delayed. I would have personally done the 6 hour drive up myself weeks ago if I had the proper tires.

And to answer an earlier question/concern his soon to be previous keeper stayed in the bus station with him in his container while she was waiting for the trip back home. Its -10 up that way and the wet cold goes right through your bones!

I am just worried because reptiles don't do well with stress. At least the type of reptiles I am use to. I don't want all this disturbance in his routine to cause some internal imbalance and he gets sick from this.

[russianuncle]

Protective as I feel on these torts in general, the flip side is that fortunately Russians are alleged to be pretty hardy. After initial welcome and care, a vet visit would be a good idea-they could probably deduce if there are any signs of post-stress related complications internally. (If I'm wrong, please somebody enter this conversation.) The right environment/lighting/diet/handling (or lack there of of physical handling in the beginning while the new RT calms down), some good supplies (a little TNT vitamin supplement to get them on the right track maybe, particularly if they cannot get occasional natural sunlight right away). This forum and it's resource links are available 365 days a year. It's a nice feeling when you have a concern. Anyway, gotta run.

[duckie68]

Just an update - I have Scuttle finally home with me safe and sound. My friends who were picking him up for me were able to make the trip up to the interior yesterday and I brought him home last night. Poor guy had to go through another looooong road trip but after I got him home I put his familiar hide in his new enclosure and set him down in front of it. He made a bee line for it and the next day I got him out to warm up under the heat lamp for a while.

Just to see if he'd be interested I offered him some greens and to my surprise he took to eating right away. He also wanted to take my fingers too - apparently he got hand fed quite a bit when he was in his previous home and I guess he associates fingers with food. I'm more scared of getting bit by him than I am of any of my snakes - lol. I'm not sure if tortoises can learn things like don't go after fingers because they're not food.

Anyway he seems to have gotten over the car trip like a trooper and he spent the day either doing a small bit of walking around his new enclosure, digging, and sleeping under his heat lamp. I wish I could figure out how to load pictures here because I did manage to take a couple of him on his first day here. I also took a magnifying glass that I use for inspecting my snakes and looked over his shell a bit (I like to be thorough when checking in on my scaly babies). There are a couple of small area's that look a bit off to me. From what I've got to go on comparison wise from the internet it looks like a very small spot of dry shell rot and a couple of small scars from previous shell rot. I've got a great expert reptile vet that I take all my snakes to so I will no doubt be making an appointment soon to get those small spots checked out.

Tomorrow's meal will get dusted with his TNT powder that's been waiting for him long before he got here 

[welovevader]

I'm gald to hear things worked out well for you guys!

[ginababy]

So happy to hear that Scuttle made it to you safe and sound!!  My Miss Baxter has bitten my fingers a couple of times, but it's definitely not intentional.  When I hand feed her, if the piece gets too small, my finger gets in the way!!  It does hurt, but no blood has even been drawn!  I just can't believe how sharp that little beak is!!!

[duckie68]

I'm trying a test to see if I can finally get pictures up. If it works this is a picture of him enjoying his first meal at home.

[duckie68]

Please forgive me to keep posting photos individually (it didn't like it when I tried posting them together. This is of him a few moments ago having a snooze under his heat lamp