Introduction of Turtle.

[VenusAndSaturn]

Hello! I currently have a Indonesian blue tongue skink named Turtle, I do not know the gender yet but for now I'm going with female. I've had her since she was around three months old, shes now around eight months. I got her from a place I regret buying from, Snakes at sunset. I got her on August, 26th of 2017, shes a bit of a handicapped skink you could say. She arrived with stuck shed which was easy to get off after a few baths, she has a missing toe on one of her back feet, she was pretty much on the verge of starving, she had parasites and has a ruptured rib cage.

Despite her rough stressful start in life she is doing quite well, I have no idea exactly how badly her injuries will effect her lifespan or her mobility as she ages but for now she is doing very well, active, eating, alert, a bit defensive but I dont blame her. I usually let her do her own thing, though I do sometimes take her out when she allows me to which usually only lasts for about five minutes or less. I'm currently trying to get her used to being handled more or at least able to come out more, usually once a week i take her out and sit on the floor with her for about fifteen minutes. And also at the end of every month I do a weigh check of all my reptiles along with if they have grown or not since last month, which helps a lot to know how shes doing with her growing and weight.

She eats about anything that moves when in feeding mode, a few times she's mistaken her tail for food and bit down on it for a second before realizing it isn't.
For insects she gets dubia roaches, turkish roaches, crickets, superworms, mealworms, BSFL, and occasionally silkworms or hornworms. Usually every two days for this.
She gets repashy omnivore mix every other day.
And then salad offered daily, usually collard greens, kale, mustard greens, turnip greens is what I usually give with the occasional squash like acorn.
For fruit she gets it mixed in once or twice a week with the salad, usually blue berries, blackberries, red raspberries, banana, and apples.

For supplements I usually dust her insects with calcium with no d3 twice a week and multivitamins once a week. Occasionally I put a small bit of both on her formulated food.

She currently lives in a 55 gallon tank, thats 48x12x20. It's bio-active, with a drainage layer. I believe the substrate mix she has is the biodudes Terra Flora, Eco earth, and Jungle mix. There is also tons of moss and leaf litter for the spring-tails and isopods, and in fact half the time I usually find her waiting underneath the moss and leaves for bugs to pass by so she can pounce on them when they least expect it. It's quite fun watching her during the day.

For lighting she currently has a 75 watt bright reptile heat lamp and a Reptisun T5 HO 10.0 46" UVB tube light with a reflective fixture.
Her basking temp at the highest can get up to 107, the areas around it get to around 90-95. I usually see her switching between the basking temps regularly during the day.
Her cool side area is around 75-80.
At night I use no lighting or heating and it stays around 70.

I plan to move her into a 50 gallon lowboy enclosure eventually that is 48x24x10. This should give her more floor space to do what she loves most, exploring and activity hunting. Maybe eventually I will build her a larger enclosure, possibly a 6x2x2 with steady populations of insects for her to hunt actively. Though it all depends on what room I have leftover once i redo my room, setup the racks and get my adult tegu enclosure in. And of course what her health state is in.

[kayla990]

Welcome! N'aaaw, such a shame they had a bad start at Snakes at Sunset... wonder how all that happened.. But great to hear she's in great hands now! hope you'll have a great time with her once she gets to know you! (and looks like you've got a pretty cool collection already!)

Awesome you've got a bioactive setup, always wondered if they'd hunt the larger isopods ^__^ (as only springtails in ours!). How did you manage the drainage layer? I'm guessing from the substrates you listed; or were you able to get in the typical hydroballs with a sturdy mesh?

Sounds like it's a great mix of food too!

[VenusAndSaturn]

I'm hoping she'll eventually warm up to me soon, but I'm fine with waiting for however long it takes. I'm pretty patient when it comes to them.

I haven't seen her hunt any isopods yet, most likely because they usually hide where she can't get to most likely. I'm sure though if I was feeding her some bugs by tong and she saw one she'd try and eat it.
And yeah the drainage layer is just hydroballs with mesh over it. It took me a while to actually figure out how to set it up at first since I hadn't really watched many videos of how to setup one. It was just a guess of trial and error.

Here's some pictures of her.
https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/367193809831854090/406622951711178773/image.jpg?width=893&height=670
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/367193809831854090/406622968563892226/image.jpg
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/367193809831854090/406931865434587136/image.jpg

[splashy07]

Awesome set up, I'd like to try that myself some day if I decide to keep Indos again. Adorable little skink! So glad he found a good home, looks happy now!

[Janella]

Congratulations on Turtle. Beautiful set up and beautiful skink. Thank you so much for helping her. I am sure she appreciates it more then you know. She will forever be grateful to you. Keep us updated on her ok.

[splashy07]

You know, I actually freaked out at first thinking you put a turtle in with your blue tongue. I'm still laughing at the name.
Bet it's the only BT on the planet with that name. You get an A for originality.

[VenusAndSaturn]

It suits her personality when I first got her quite well. Its nice seeing how much of a improvement she's made over the months.
I'll definitely keep you guys updated on her.