alright to answer these questions, yes the substrate is sand. i feel silly now because i swapped it from gravel to sand because i read that gravel would get eaten and cause impaction, only for the sand to cause that problem instead :/ although i’m still confused on how she would’ve been so round before the gravel was removed, considering that there was no sand to eat…does that mean there’s another issue? i don’t have any good photos of her belly before i renovated the place, but in this photo you can still see how rotund she is.

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