Hi all,
About two weeks ago we bought two baby turts at a pet store here in Jordan, where we have never seen semi-aquatics and where to our knowledge there are no native species. The store was caring for them well, with a hundred or so hatchlings split into four large tanks, all with great filtration and plenty of basking space for everyone. (Although if they don't find homes in the first year or so, there will be a problem...) The salesman didn't know what species they were, and we forgot to ask where they were imported from. When we went back the following week to ask (and to get another one) the branch had closed and all its contents had been moved to another branch across town. We hope to get there soon.
Anyway, we haven't been able to identify them online (thanks for the chelonian.org link, marisa). From their general similarity to RES--except for no red stripe, darker coloring, very long tail, and slightly longer legs and neck--our best guess is that they might be some other type of Slider. Please check out the pics of Scurvy and Tweezer linked below and give us some help if you can. The pics were taken in their temporary setup--they LOVE their rubber duck.
On a side note, the smaller one (Scurvy) learned to submerge right in front of our eyes. He would point his head down and paddle as hard as he could, but had no luck reaching the bottom. Then apparently he realized how to use his lungs to sink straight down--although he still has trouble. For the first day he could barely even break the surface tension of the water because he was so light. We joke that one of his parents was a frog because he can inflate his neck to twice the size of his head. The other one is named Tweezer because we acccidentally let him get his mouth around a whole food pellet, which of course got wedged (like you trying to eat a tennis ball!) and had to be extracted with tweezers.
Best,
Phil & Diya
http://photos.yahoo.com/philip_lentz/ (Check out our 3 tortoises in the other gallery, too!)