Photo Gallery :: My turtles. :)

[valladin82]

They're hangin out in a bowl while I was fixing something on their tank. Come to think about it, how early in age or size do turtles shed scutes? I already seen skin shedding.

[valladin82]

One more. Lights where out in the room, the only light source that was in this pic was from the camera flash. Gotta say I like my new camera. lol Anyways, sleeping babies.

[Tholapsyx]

Beautiful! I love the shell patterns of the second one!

[valladin82]

Thanks. Snots a yellow bellied slider. Saved from a pet store employee who dropped the poor thing on the ground on its back. I walked over and told her I wanted the turtle...NOW.

[steve]

Scute shedding is a slow process, it's never easy to approximate it. Growing too fast might make it take longer for him to start shedding.

[valladin82]

Hmmm, well I'm not sure if hes growing too fast but I have put a stop to how much I was feeding him in the past. I was just curious if maybe you think "Booger" has something going on with his scutes. I saw some other people's turtles and I guess his is pretty normal. I do see odd thing pieces of what look like flaked off shell in the tank. Its pretty hard to spot them though because they're so thin. Only seen one or two of these pieces and I'm not even sure they are what I think.

[steve]

The main indication of fast growth is the thickness of the seams between the scutes.

[valladin82]

Ahh, I think I see it. Glad I cut them off then. Booger was always the piglet when it came to eating, would try to eat every piece I put in the water. So I greatly reduced how much I was feeding them to about 4-5 pellets a day for each. Though I'm still monitoring their growth with a measuring tape. If it still seems fast I will probably end up feeding every other day. My yellow belly is different though. No matter how much I put in the bowl when I feed him/her it only seems to eat a few pellets and ignores the rest. I didn't think there would be a difference in appetite between yellow and RES?

I also started throwing a couple small pieces of romaine and shaved thin pieces of cuttlebone into the tank when I see them begging. Its fun watching them swim after the pieces cause the current from the filter pushes them around. They actually eat them now that I cut out the pellet intake.

Thanks Steve Its hard to find information on the signs of overfeeding on smaller turtles. Always seem to come up with only the "results" of it. Like huge deformed turtles and stuff. Its nice to know what to look for now. I appreciate it.

[steve]

No prob, that's what we're here for The appetite difference can just be attributed to different personalities. RES are generally considered pretty aggressive.