I have to central american wood turtles. Lets hear what everyone else has. all the other forum topics are very active except a few and this is one of them. So lets do something about it turtle owners.
I have a common snapper. He's a rescue that will be going back to the wild next spring. He hatched near a roadside and was almost hit by a car. I guess his siblings went the other direction! lol Anyways, he's almost big enough to make it in the wild. Didn't want to release him too soon but we've kept his environment as natural as possible, making him catch his own food, etc. How old are your turtles?
I'm not sure there rescues for a pet store. I don't want to say the name but they claim to be Smart about pets. We saw these 2 turtles several weeks before we bought them. They were in a small cage maybe 10 gallon if they were lucky. think someone would buy them really soon we left the store and when we came back serveral weeks later they were still there so we bought them and are now in the progress of building them a new enclosure. We currently house them in a 55 gallon which is still to small for them but it's better then the 10 gallon they were in. Well back to you question is there a way to tell how old the turtles are? Shane
The only way I've ever known is by size. Meaning that most turtles grow at a certain rate for their species. So you kind of calculate how fast they grow (ideally) by their general maximum size. There may be other ways but I don't know them. It's hard when you don't know their approx. hatch date...it's all educated guesswork most of the time. I'm glad you bought them. I know people say that if you buy them then they'll get more to sell and then there will be more turtles to rescue, but...that's exactly how I got my gecko. There was no way I was leaving him there to die. I'm sorry...but I just can't do that.
Oh, BTW...an American Wood Turtle gets to be between 7-9 inches approximately. That's carapace length only. It doesn't include the head. And...they are excellent climbers! Make sure your new enclosure has a sturdy lid on it! What are you feeding?
I plan on building a nice strudy lid to prevent anything from getting in that shouldn't be getting in and the turtles from getting out. I feed them lettuce, strawberries, bananas and crickets. I'll feed them the strawberries and bananas every once in a while. They mostly get the lettuce and crickets. They tend to only eat the bananas and strawberries if I mix them in with the lettuce and crickets. I haven't measured the turtles but I would say one is about 5in. and the other is 7in.
You could try offering come nightcrawlers or feeder fish and also some mixed greens like dandelion leaves or mustard greens to help vary the diet. I know what you mean about them not eating the greens when the fruit is there. All of our herps are the same way. That's why "treat" day is once a week! lol I found another source that said the average size is between 5-9 inches. It depends on the sex, so your little guys may be fully grown.
If I feed them nightcrawlers do i just put them in the enclosure anywhere or in the food dish. Also are we talking about the some type of nightcrawlers you get at a bait shop for fishing?
Yeah, bait worms are the same. I would try putting them in a food dish. Just by themselves and then wash the dish out good afterwards. Also, make sure you rinse the worms good to make sure you get all the dirt off of them.
Hi, I have a few turtles. I have a two year old miss map, 1 southern painted turtle, 2 stinkpots, 1 leatherback musk, 1 razorback musk, and 1 mississippi mud. They are all fed a variety of live foods, pellets, and veggies. They have adopted two feeder fish. hehe. I also have to yearlings sulcata tortoises.
That's a lot of babies to look after wecko!! lol Our snapper adopted his guppies now we have dozens of babies! Got any pics?
Do you have to keep all them turtle in there own enclosure of do they go in to just one. If they a seperate how do you have the time to take care of them all. By time I get home from work and talk care of my 2 turtles, 2 dogs, 2 cats I've had enough. Animals are a full time job by themselves.
I spend a lot of time caring for my animals. I have all of my water turtles,7, in one 55 gal.One is in a five gallon on dry dock. 5 of them are as small as a quarter.Water level in the big tank must be maintian everyday so as the samller turtles can bask. I feed the musks in a seperate tank everyday. They are still hatchings and were negleted by previous owners(they where covered in fungus. Every sat the tank is cleaned and the turtles come out to be scrubbed, checked over, then I conditon there shells w/vitashell. The sulcatas have an indoor enclosure and two kiddie pools of grass outside grown for there main diet. I also have and iggy,bearded and 2 leo geckos, plus two 70 pnd huskies. In the afternoon the lizards get there veggies and crickets every other day. When I'm not feeding or cleaning I'm handling these guys. over half of my family were neglected or abuse creatures that blossomed in the right environment and some tlc. But we now have no more room. Thankfullly I have a vet who takes payments. Everyone has a basking light and uvb bulb, that makes eight lights. To me they're worth all the effort. Even though my beardy bit me tonight.hehe.
the pics were great! thanks for sharing! sounds like a lot of work. are you planning on keeping all of them or do you just rehab? When all those baby turtles grow up...well...that's a lot of tanks! lol
When those turtles grow up to adults could they be released into the wild? I would think they would be unable to fend for themselves since they are use to being in an enclosure for so long. I don;t know much about taking care of Turtles or reptiles but I'm trying to learn.
This thread has been quiet for a while so...how's everyone's babies? Hey scarr, did your wood's eat the nightcrawlers? How are all your babies wecko?
Sorry about the quiet time around here my home computer is broken right now and I haven't had time to fix it. So the only Internet access I have at work and they log all our browsing, so I don't like to visit during work. I went to get some nightcrawlers at this bait shop by my work and they didn't have any, so I haven't got a chance to feed my Turtles the nightcrawlers yet. I plan to stop by there this week and try again. For though that want to take a look I have new pictures of the Turtle enclosure I'm building. pictures - http://apps.kua.com/enclosure/
One of the baby stinkpots we rescued died. It had been in drydock for almost 3 weeks and I decided it was well enough to go bank into the 55 with the other turtles. The day after I did this my husband found it floating and he said it looked like the other turts had been biting him. I feel I put him to his death. But on the other hand, for a short while he lived a good life. Before we got him he had fungus and was living in a death bowl with no heat and no lights. The other turtles are doing great. The other babies we took in now have no fungus and there shells have hardened and they have lots of room to swim. The sulcatas are eating and growing, of course i never thought I'd have a problem with that.
Wecko- SOrry to hear about your baby. I'm sure you tried as hard as you could. Sometimes we just lose them no matter how hard we try. But at least you tried and it sound slike you tried harder than the previous owners. Scarr-The enclosure is really coming along. I'm sure your babies will appreciate it!
Biochic - I finally got the nightcrawlers and they were a big hit with the turtles. They was scared of them at first but after they got use to them they loved them. Enclosure update - I have just finished waterproofing the inside. I used 2 part epoxy to get this done. All that is left is the front plexiglass or glass, built in selves, an lid.
