How to treat a RI in read ear slider turtles. There are no VET for a turtle near my place. He is not eating food from past 2 weeks. I used to stay in Bangalore and now have shifted to tamilnadu. Intial days he was fine but now he is not much active and not at all eating food. I saw online videos for RI in turtles and he is behaving the same. Opening his mouth and gasping for breath? Please help me..

Updated On May 5th, 2017

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Answered By Jeffrey Milner

Veterinarian

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Unfortunately if your turtle is gasping for air and having difficulty breathing this is what we refer to as breathing agonally. Typically this is an indication that your turtle may be dying. If Ducker hasn't also eaten in two weeks this is also a very poor prognostic indicator. While I understand your dilemma of being far from a veterinarian that will see a turtle, he is definitely in need of immediate veterinary care including oxygen and nutritional supplementation. There is not much you are going to be able to do from home. If you are able to force feed a product such as critical care this might be beneficial. However due to his respiratory distress you could end up causing aspiration pneumonia while trying to feed him. I hope you are able to find him some help.

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