u/Clear_Cycle_9124

Hi all! When I got home from work this evening, I found a bunch of crap in the alley left by someone who’d moved out earlier today, including this little guy :( I brought it inside since it’s been really chilly today, but I don’t have any of the equipment I’d need to take care of a turtle. I don’t even have any fresh veggies to feed it 😭 Because of this, I honestly feel nervous about even keeping it overnight :(

There’s a local Chicago rescue (CLEARescue) that takes in exotic birds and reptiles, but when I checked their website it said they aren’t able to accept aquatic turtle rescues due to the amount of inquiries they receive in a week. I’m sure it’s still worth contacting them, but in the event they’re at capacity, would anyone be able to take it in?

I also tried posting this in the r/chicago subreddit, but I wasn’t able to since my karma isn’t high enough. If someone would be kind enough to cross post, I’d really appreciate it!

I’m located in Printer’s Row, South Loop, but I’m willing to make a local commute to drop this little guy off at a new home! Please feel free to message me!!

TW: multiple deaths due to crypto; DANGEROUS care: cohab, heat mat, tubs and outdated practices.

From left to right: LOLA 1 month before death, 2 years post crypto flair up, 4 years post crypto flair up, 5 months old. STN 2 months old, 3 months old, 1 month before death, 2 weeks before death, male 1.5 month quarantine.

I labeled it dangerous practices as I used to cohab my geckos in 2016 because I did not know any better :( I trusted the people at the expo and I had limited resources outside of books that said that this was okay with enough food and space. No injuries resulted from the cohab, but crypto spread like wildfire through my collection :(

I DO NOT CONDONE COHABITATION, KEEPING GECKOS IN TOTES UNLESS NECESSARY, OR UNDER TANK HEAT MATS. I am retelling a story that started in 2015 so please be kind, I was 14 when I started.

It was my first ever reptile expo back when they were cool. It was repticon and I had been begging my parents to go. They dropped me off with some friends and I remember attending all the classes they had. I felt motivated to get my first leopard gecko.

I picked her out cause she blinked at me :) she was a fiery girl who never really tamed down. she was het tangerine het MAC bell giant from both sides. She was an itty bitty baby. Her name was STN. A year passed and I got the itch to get another critter. I finally got the albino of my dreams, a het RAPTOR homo tremper with pretty red eyes. Her name was Lola. I initially had them in their own bins that were xxl heavy duty sterlite bins with ventilation.

One day, STNs heat mat malfunctioned and like an idiot, I got her an off brand mat with a built in thermostat that cost $45 because zoo med and other mats would sell for $70-$100 for an equivalent size.

GUESS WHAT. The off brand got so hot it melted the plastic and started to burn the coco soil mix. Idk how STN survived but she did with no issues. I should have known. I didn’t access have Reddit or YouTube very readily so I’d look up what I could at the library but I never came across the fact that you should never use offbrand heat mat.

So I looked it up and you could cohabitate leopard geckos as long as you had a large enough enclosure. So what did I do? I grabbed a Christmas tree tote and cohabed them -.-

Nothing came about cohabing them, I had a large heat gradient with 2 water sources, 2 bowls, pretty much 2x everything.

I finally got YouTube and what did I find :(

People were successfully cohabing more than 2 leopard geckos. I really wanted to make a new linage of gecko so guess what. I went back to the expo…

In these 2 years, I had also gotten a poor man’s leeche, 2 ball pythons, and a reticulated python. All kept in tubs but “appropriate” size tubs at the time. I was told that was long as 2 sides = snake, then snake would be happy as too big = too scary??? as you can tell I was heavily influenced by the rack influencers.

My ultimate goal was to build a reptile room like all those large influencers. Going back to the story I find the male gecko of my dreams. Beautiful critter, a Mac snow radar

I quarantined the male for a few months and everything seemed fine at the time. The closest reptile vet was 7 hours away and I didn’t have a care so I never thought to check for anything.

I proceeded to cohab all three of them. Lo and behold, multiple animals start falling ill. I couldn’t keep any weight on them. It was horrific. I couldn’t afford the testing for all of my animals so I had to choose who lived and who died. I euthanized all the snakes since they were losing the weight that fastest and the poor man’s as well since I knew it wouldn’t tolerate being handled enough for treatment. *im crying a lot from being an idiot to this day*

The male who “passed” quarantine died as well. All I had left was STN and Lola. I never cohabited again.

It was hell trying to get them to recover but they put on the weight over time only to lose it. Eventually, they stabilized at slightly underweight, even with repticare, grub mix, waxworms, and mealworms (horned worms weren’t a thing yet).

STN lived from 2015-2020. A short 5 years. I made the choice to euthanize her as I couldn’t put anymore weight on her and she kept losing it. Lola lived from late 2015 to late 2023. She was also euthanized after becoming skeletal despite being responsive, eating, and coming at her name. I couldn’t stand seeing them lose coordination and I couldn’t put the weight on them.

My heart is broken and I am frustrated. I owned one crested gecko after that and I had to give him away from the paranoia of him contracting crypto. I disclosed to his new owner my past. Lola’s tank goes unused and I refuse to sell it for ethical reasons. All the tubes were thrown out. EVERYTHING that was ever in their tanks has been thrown out/destroyed so that no one else can use it. I was carful to dispose of everything in hazardous bags as hazardous waste which was ridiculously expensive.

I miss them dearly. I wish I could stop myself from getting that male. I truly believe it was the male gecko or from somewhere else in that show. Take a page from my book and please respond to my post, im not sure how to handle this grief.