General Care Discussion :: New turtle owner. am i doing ok?

[Shelldon]

Hello everyone!

i got my turtle, shelldon, july 19th and since then (actually since 3 months before) i have been reading EVERYTHING the RES site has to tell. i do have gravel at the bottom, but after reading the stickied gravel topic i will be removing it next time i clean the tank (in a week) i have a magnetic basking plateform in the corner of my tank and a FLuval V2 filter beside it. (when i walk into the room, shelldon sometimes gets scared while basking so he jumps off, sometimes bumping onto the slightly submerged filter.) He has 2 small cracks on the bottom front of his shell, wich must be from bumping into the filter. i moved the filter lower, but will move it under the basking platform so the problem doesnt occur. is there anything special i should do to fix the cracks?

ok i just noticed him trying to eat gravel... is there a way i can get the gravel out of the tank without having to drain the water? or should i just wait until cleaning time comes around and buy bigger rocks for the bottom... maybe ill even not have anything on the bottom in terms of rocks or gravel.

[Marcus.85]

You can remove the gravel with an aquarium fishnet.. You do need a fairly large one tho.

[Shelldon]

yeah i did that just now when i caught him trying to eat some of it :/

[OxymoronFromMars]

You should immediatly go to the vet about the cracks in your turtle's shell. The came develope into something much worse, so it says on the site. http://www.redearslider.com/shell_conditions.html And how big is your tank? How big is the filter? If you have a small tank with a big filter i suggest buying a tetra 10i whisper (that's what I use), depending on the size of your tank though.

[Shelldon]

i have a fluval u2 filter but im getting another because this one is not big enough. should i post pictures of the cracksÉ im not even sure if theyre cracks or just parts of the shell formation... ill post some pictures

[Shelldon]

i looked at the shell again to take a picture and i noticed that theres an exact paralel to it on the other side... its a part of the shell.... my bad.

[steve]

I would do a complete water change when removing the gravel... lots of gunk will get stirred up when you are removing it.

[Shelldon]

done and done. i also put in some fine, fine sand to replace it it looks sweeeeet

[steve]

Post pics of the updated setup

[Shelldon]

will do! the sand is still settling, but it looks like its doing better.

[Shelldon]

Took pics!

Shelldon! (named after the character from The Big Bang Theory)

Heres the tank with the gravel that i took when i first set up the tank

heres the tank with the blue sand while its still settling (in the botton left you can see my four feeder minnows, Breakfast, Brunch, Lunch, and Dinner

and my basking area (75Wsunglow bulb and a 25W UVB light)



i loveee my turtle and i want the best for him!!!