General Care Discussion :: Were they doing a mating ritual?

[khobbs]

Today, again, I was sitting on the couch and looked over at the turtles. They were "fluttering" (?) their claws in each others faces. They did this a few times, and the just a few minutes ago they did again, but then our bigger turtle like climbed on the back of our other turtle, and really looked like it was trying to latch on, but then the smaller one swam away. Is this what I think it is? They aren't very old, that's why I don't understand this behavior. I haven't seen them do this until recently. They aren't even over 4 inches yet. Any advice?

[adammaxis]

How big is your tank?

It could be aggression.

[khobbs]

It's a 30 gallon. It's all that I can afford for now, but they each have their own space and there are things in the tank to disturb their line of vision so they can't see each other all the time. They have been fine. It just started a couple of days ago.

[adammaxis]

My turtles were doing it for a little while.. and then they stopped. I am very sure that it was aggression in my case, and I do believe that it is in yours too.

[marisa]

Young turtles will do this to each other. It can be agression, but not always. Just keep your eyes open in case it gets worse.