A POSSIBLE CURE FOR SHELL ROT!!!!
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VERY IMPORTANT, PLEASE READ: I possibly have found a real solution to SHELL ROT. I have been dealing with this problem for as long as I have had diamondback terrapins. Nearly every adult I have received has either had shell rot when I got them or developed it within a month or two. I have always kept salt in my tanks. At first I use to keep a half a cup of rock salt for every ten gallons, which is about 0.004, but it didn’t stop the shell rot. For the most part it seemed to take at least a year to a year in a half for the shell rot to run its course, no matter what I tried to clear it up. Once the shell rot is completely gone the terrapin never has it come back again. Last year I got a lot of new diamondbacks, some of them were wild caught and most of them were captive born. Some of the wild caughts and one of the captive borns developed shell rot. I increased the salt to one and a half cups, which is about 0.010, but the shell rot still continued to spread and some other newer captive born diamondbacks started develop shell rot. I was really getting depressed, shell rot has been such a problem for so long and I have tried just about everything to stop it with no really success. Recently I increased my salt level to 0.017 and suddenly the shell rot stopped dead in its tracks. It has been a month and diamondbacks that had very small spots of shell rot have cleared up completely. Other diamondbacks that had shell rot really bad have shown a lot of improvement. There are no new shell rot spots on their carapaces, and their shells are looking much better. Because of the higher level of salt they need to be placed in fresh water at least once a week. Since I feed them fish every other day in their feeding sinks they get the fresh water they needed. It is pretty cool, when I put them in the sink they will take a couple of bites of fish but then they freeze and start drinking water. The will stay completely still with their arms and legs out for a couple of minutes as they drink through their nose. I hope this helps everyone. Thanks Jonathan Diamondback Terrapin World http://www.diamondbackterrapin.com
Johnathan…what does shell rot look like? I have a male with lots of pitting in his shell ..could this be shell rot? Rich Hollander
Rich, Shell rot normally starts on the plastron. It starts with small white spots form under the scutes. Once it breaks through the scute it is normally a much bigger spot. Shell rot is normally very soft and can be cleaned off the diamondback but it will come back. I have seen several start to bleed from the pits on their plastron. Normally small pits will keep growing until they have nearly distroyed the entire plastron. I will try to post some picture this afternoon. Jonathan http://www.diamondbackterrapin.com — In diamondbackterrapins@yahoogroups.com, Richard Hollander
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