The "Filter Media Thread" serves as a reference for filtration best practices derived from Turtle Talk community experience. Recommendations here are specific to aquatic turtle keeping and may differ from your filter manufacturer's documentation. It is ultimately the decision of the individual turtle keeper to choose what to do with any information presented on this forum. There is an ongoing effort to continuously edit and improve this thread, so please send me a message if you spot an error or would like the addition of a particular filter.
FILTER SIZE
We must first know what size environment for our turtle. From the main portion of the website: "A guideline to determine this size used by many keepers, as a minimum, is 10 gallons of tank per each inch of shell length (refer to SCL for correct shell measurement). Therefore, a single adult RES will require anywhere between a 90 to a 120 gallon tank."
Advertised filter specifications are assumedly based on filtration needs for an appropriately stocked community fish tank. A single aquatic turtle produces a much greater bio load than an average community of fish. Therefore the guideline we follow is to divide the filter's advertised capacity rating by three. For example, a filter rated to handle an aquarium up to 150 gallons, should adequately filter up to 50 gallons of aquatic turtle environment water to which I will refer throughout this thread as "turtle gallons". This is only a suggested guideline as different filters have different operational designs, pumps, and flow rates. The turtle gallon ratings are for adult sized turtles.
MEDIA
There's three types of filtration media needed for a healthy turtle environment: mechanical, chemical and biological. Descriptions of each of these media types can be found on the main part of the site: http://www.redearslider.com/filtration.html
Mechanical media types most commonly used in turtle keeping are synthetic sponge pads and filter floss. Sponge pads are usually provided or sold by the filter manufacturer specific to a filter model due to their unique shape or size. Sponge pads can be cleaned, rinsed and reused many times. Filter floss is a universal, temporary, inexpensive, disposable media capable of trapping very small particles. Filter floss is sold in the fish section of most pet stores and is also available as "polyfill" or "pillow stuffing" in the crafts or sewing section of many other stores.
Chemical media recommended for aquatic turtle filtration is activated carbon and/or Purigen.
Carbon needs to be replaced regularly and can last from a few days to a month depending on water conditions.
Info on Purigen is available here: Seachem Purigen
Biological media recommended for aquatic turtle filtration is ceramic rings, stars, or nuggets. Bio media is available from many manufacturers with the only comparable differences being packaging, price, and shape. There are other types of bio media available, but the ceramic media provides the most amount of surface area.
OPTIONAL SETUP*
A temporary media configuration via the use of filter floss and carbon is provided for the following use cases:
- Water Polishing: removal of fine particles such as suspended sand to clarify cloudy water
- Water Conditioning: removal of chlorine and chloramine without adding conditioning chemicals
- Tank Cleaning: major cleaning events can stir up gunk that can quickly consume regular filtration media
*Diagrams will be indicated as "optional"
SUGGESTED NEW TANK SETUP
This setup method is useful if you are using non-filtered tap water and/or have sand substrate.
No hazardous water conditioning chemicals are needed for this setup method.
- Place your substrate in your tank (skip this step for bare bottom tanks)
- Fill your tank with cold tap water
- Set your filter up for the "optional" media configuration
- Install, set, and turn on your aquarium heater
- Install and turn on your filter
- After 24-48 hours, turn off your filter
- Reconfigure your filter for "normal" media configuration
- Turn your filter back on
QUICK LINKS
