Habitat - Indoor :: Worried about deep water.

[DanielRES1180]

I just got done filling up the new tank I bought the other day and went ahead and put the turtles in the tank. Due to the fact that the guy from Tetra told me that the Whisper filter only worked if the tank was almost filled with water, I went ahead and filled the tank a little over 3/4 of the way up. The turtles in there are struggling to float in 1 1/2 feet of water. Right now one of them is clinging for his life onto the floating turtle dock. Will they drown overnight?

[jenaero]

Give them stuff to float on. Buy some plastic plants with suction cups (made for reptile cages but they hold up well in water) and stick them on the sides, just below the surface of the water. How big is the tank and how big are the turtles?

[DanielRES1180]

It's a 55 gallon tank with two 3'' turtles and the other 2.5''. I think I'll go to Wal-Mart later on and see what's the best they have.

[jenaero]

How strong is the current from the filter? If that's an issue you might want to put one of the plants in front of the output tube. Turts of that size should be just fine in water that deep but go get the plants anyway.

Oh, and make sure there's no way they can get out with the water that high. I thought my tank was secure and mine got out.

[DanielRES1180]

Wow . Did they manage to push the lid? I'm sure those lids weigh tons in turtle terms .

[jenaero]

Actually, the first escape was made when I had no lid on the tank. They never showed any interest in climbing out before, and I had no other pets at the time so I didn't think that much of it. Came home from work to see only 1 turtle in the tank. I found her a few hours later, no real harm done. After that, I put a screen over the basking area with a hole cut big enough for the lamp to sit over. I came home one day about a week later to find the other turtle sitting on top of the screen, under the lamp. After that I resorted to an oven rack over the basking area. That was with my 50gal. I dont use anything on top now because I upgraded to a 125gal and there's just no way out of that thing.

[DanielRES1180]

Well it seems that the little guys are doing better at swimming deep water. Yeah, the turtles are used to the water, I knew deep down that would happen but I was busy freaking out.