well I’m not a vet, and I definitely can’t say that they are right or wrong. Please remember that. I just read, and learn from lots of irrational and rational panicking. From what I’ve read/ seen on the mailing list I’m on vomiting is an EMERGENCY aka go to the vet ASAP and its serious. so in that sense the vet is saying what I know..but I know if I were you I’d be concerned that vomiting happened and then they say he looks healthy. Can you describe any other symptoms shaq might be having? can you think of something that happened right before the vomiting happened that could have induced it? eating something strange?
my only advice can is random knowledge from my experience with zoya and from reading mailinglists and message boards and here it is: 1. make sure your vet is knowledgable about tortoise care. It sounds weird but its not that easy to find. And sometimes they don’t really know much they took a class etc.. not an exotics expert. 2. I’d recommend joining the russian tortoise yahoo group http://pets.groups.yahoo.com/group/RussianTortoise/ . you’ve got researchers, rescuers, and people raising tortoises for years and years that know everything I know (cause I learned it from them) and could give you better advice than I can and might be able to recommend a different vet in your area?
Vomiting is not good, and something is definitely wrong. Its hard to with non traditional animals that not all vets know about.. getting info is key. Fingers crossed that the blood tests are ok. Did they take a fecal sample? I read some articles/peoples experiences that said that sometimes if a tortoise has worms they can actually cause chocking because they are exiting through other orifices.. again NOT A VET. Just done lots of paranoid asking because I constantly worry about Zoya. The antibiotics could help too so hopefully that’ll make it better.
I am thinking about Shaq and you all. Please keep us updated. Any experienced tortoise owners reading this have any thoughts??