General Care Discussion :: Seriosuly, why is everyones turtle huge?

[Meta]

Mines 9 years old, female most likely, and is only about 5-6 inches. Everyones turtle here is like tall and huge and big and massive

[Meta]

like, how old is that lola

this turtle i have had no basking/lights/ or anything. it was kept in a little tank with an inch of water for like the 1st 6 years of its life. is it permanently stunted growth?

[Daniel3507]

im not sure if the growth has permanently been stunted, but i definitely has attributed to the small size of your turtle. if the problems have been corrected she may start to grow again.

[Meta]

my turtle has bad case of retained scutes. i wanna get these off asap . anything i can do to speed it up? she basks everyday for hours but wont shed. a lot of the outer scutes, the smaller ones, are nearly off, but they just wont come off. i fed her some sweet potato i cookedi n the microwave(is microwave good?) and will take advice on wat to do to shed quicker

[Daniel3507]

shedding is just a waiting game. the best thing to do is provide the UVB and the occasional treat high in vitamin e. as for the microwave, i have no idea. ive never fed sweet potato so im not too sure.

[SpotsMama]

Her growth very well may have been stunted by her earlier substandard contitions. She may not ever reach her potential size.

Have you had a stool sample checked for internal parasites? That's a common reason for slow or no growth in turtles. It's easy for a vet to do - shouldn't cost much.

Daniel said it right - shedding is a waiting game but all the conditions have to be healthy for a turtle to have a healthy shell that sheds like it should. He/she has to bask regularly and dry out - top and bottom - under good UVB light. The diet has to be healthy and especially contain a lot of calcium - cuttlebone in the tank is an excellent source of calcium. The diet has to contain some vitamin e - in addition to a little steamed sweet potato, good sources are blueberries, tomato, turnip greens and apple peel. The water must be kept clean.

[Dein211]

i probably wouldnt microwave them. you;ll remove a lot of the nutirents that way. i dont think they really need to be heated anyway but if you do want to heat them the best way to keep nutirents in a veggie is to steam cook it. you could also try blue berries and i know after i gave rolo a cuttle bone durring her shedding period she could drop like 2 or three scutes in a day or two. then it would slow down untill the next consuption of cuttle bone. otherwise yeah its a boring waiting situation lol took rolo almost a year before they started to drop becasue of the condition her shell was in when i got her. then once they started dropping i'd say it only took about a month and a half maybe two before they were all gone.

[Meta]

Her growth very well may have been stunted by her earlier substandard contitions. She may not ever reach her potential size.

Have you had a stool sample checked for internal parasites? That's a common reason for slow or no growth in turtles. It's easy for a vet to do - shouldn't cost much.
.

parasites ewww what kind

[BullDog]

For the microwave, I usually microwave sweet potato for my res. I put it in some water, and nuke it until it's soft.
I usually cook sweet potato, squash, and sometimes (rarely) carrots this way.
I've been waiting a year for my big female to shed (I think she came from a similar background as yours). There's not much you can do except provide her with a good habitat, and good food.
In the year's time, I've definitely noticed her scutes starting to lift a lot, but have only found one tiny little piece of shell that she's shed.

[SpotsMama]

Parasites - well, worms. Parasites just sounds nicer. I think turtles can also get amoebas which are also technically parasites, but worms is the common type. Round worms, flat worms, tape worms - there's a whole variety.

[TheComputerGremlin]

You can also make a mini baked sweet potato, wrap a smaller piece in aluminum foil and bake it for a few minutes until soft.

[ESG4Life]

i know this is off topic but....
i just got an RES second hand (whatever you wana call it) its abt maybe 4 1/2 inches. how do i tell how old he is

[BullDog]

ESG - There is no way to tell. It's very dependent on genetics and previous care. But to put in a guess he's probably about 2 years old. RES tend to be 3.5-4" after 1 year, and grow about 1/2" per year after that.

But, as you can see from this topic, it could be that he's several years older, and has been stunted from previous care, or it could be that he was overfed early and is only 1 year old.