General Care Discussion :: Eating Turtle Feces

[TheNunOwnedGoat]

Haha, you all thought I was the sicko eating my RES's feces, didn't you? I'm not that weird...

It's my turtle, Lucy, who is eating her own feces. We've slowly been noticing a decrease in the amount of feces floating in the bottom of her aquarium each night. At first, I thought she was constipated.

Nope. She's eating her own feces. I'm in the process of cleaning out the aquarium right now, and she's in her feeding dish (I use a large plastic storage unit to feed her). I noticed that she had JUST... excreted some feces. A moment later, while I was dumping water back into the aquarium, I watched her eat it before I could swat her away.

Whenever I can, I scoop out her feces using... I don't know what it's called, some cooking device, kinda similar to what you use to clean out a baby's nose. Obviously, I don't use this for cooking also.

Just now, I had just finished feeding her when she ate her own feces. I can't imagine that she's still hungry, but maybe she is...?

So, my questions:

-How dangerous is it for her to be eating her own feces?

-Like I mentioned above, is she still hungry? Is that what is causing her to eat her own feces? What are some other possibilities?

-Most importantly: what can I do to make her stop, if anything? Obviously I scoop it out when I can, but I can't be available to sit and watch the aquarium for turtle poop all day!

Thanks for your help.

[jenaero]

It's not dangerous. I like to think of it as recycling. Whatever nutrients she didnt get the first time, she'll get the second time.

RES are very opportunistic eaters. They'll eat anything and everything they can, because they dont know when the next meal will be.

Not much you can do except scoop it out when you see it. Mine do it all the time.

[steve]

Try to find out if your turtle poops at certain times of the day or after eating. I know my male RES will poop a few minutes after eating, so I'm always hanging around the tank after feeding him.

[marisa]

I'm assuming you're talking about a turkey baster. Yes, they do work well as long as you can catch the poop in time.

[iac637]

we took somthing like a python and put pantyhose on the end so that it gets all the poop but doesn't take out any water

[industrial_girl_2000]

All turtles eat their own feces, the same way that aquatic frogs eat their own shed skin. It's normal for them (gross for us to watch, yikes!!). Don't worry, it doesn't mean you have to feed your turtle more (unless you want him/her to poop more, in which case they would eat even MORE of their own feces....it's a vicious cycle, LOL!!!).

Every now & then I am able to catch my turtle's feces....I scoop it out & take it out to my flowerbed since it is good for the flowers. Her feces are rather large, so a turkey baster just won't cut it. I use a spoon or just pick it up by hand (and then scrub with soap furiously afterwards). My flowers are doing great.

[SpotsMama]

Spot used to eat feces when he was little but doesn't seem interested anymore now that he's grown (thank you! thank you!). It's hard to get them with a turkey baster anymore but I can scoop them out with a net. But best of all is this little device that someone on here told us about. It's called Mr. Cleaner and this one was advertised at Drsfosterandsmith in the fish section:

[marisa]

That looks like the Super Gravel Vac I used to use. Turkey basters of course work best with smaller turtles (and their smaller poop). How big is Lucy?

[iac637]

that looks almost like what Tertle and I came up with out of things we have at the house

[SpotsMama]

i just love it. I took that big bottom attachment off so it's just a straight, narrow tube with more suction. I vac the bottom every morning. The last filter cleaning was very easy too - I think picking the stuff up in the vac before it gets to the filter helps keep it clean too.

[TheNunOwnedGoat]

Thanks for everybody's help. I'm glad to here that it's not dangerous and pretty natural for her to eat what she excretes...

And it is a turkey baster that I use to scoop out her feces... she's still pretty small (basically 4") so it's working for now... when I can get to it in time.

SpotsMama... that device looks pretty clever. Was it very expensive?

Like I said, thanks for all your help.

[SpotsMama]

it was only $10. It's battery powered, so you have to change the batteries every week or two. It comes with two of the little vaccum cleaner bags and you can get more for about $2 for a set of four. But you can keep re-using the original bags if you want - they are washable.

If you buy it on-line it's not expensive but you do have to pay shipping, so if I were you I'd wait and buy it in combination with some other stuff since most places will give you free shipping if you buy enough stuff.