General Care Discussion :: do my turtles need water to survive?

[charlesyim]

a RES does it really need to swim in the water?or need it?

[xsavingsaturdayx]

uhhh, yeah......the poor thing will die from dehydration.

[jenaero]

Now I'm curious...what is your setup like?

[flutterby]

a RES does it really need to swim in the water?or need it?

Let me ask you something.... since RES are AQUATIC turtles... what do you think?

[Spookster]

Well it's an aquatic turtle... where do you suppose aquatic turtles live

[Jessica313]

what has he been living in if hes not in water???? like flutterby said, RES ARE AQUATIC TURTLES...... meaning they NEED to LIVE in water...............

[megcornell]

There are pictures of charlesyim's setup in the photo gallery, his turtles are in water, I think perhaps he was just curious as to the turtle's needs...

[flutterby]

They look like they're in a dish pan with about a few inches of water, if that.

[CountryGirl68]

Charlesyim, RES are considered semi-aquatic turtles because they spend time in water and out of it. But they will only go out of the water to get warm so make sure they have a good amount of water. The water level should be at least twice their full body length but the more water, the better it is for them.

[ahguiturtle]

I wonder whether u own a RES n have this kind of dry setup for yr RES
or u ask this question just want to have a better understanding of RES before u own one.

If u own RES, yr RES must have suffer w/o water n its skin must be very dry.

[marisa]

RES are aquatic and, given normal conditions, spend about 80% of their time in water. They need to be in water to eat. They're also agressive baskers and need a basking area with correct lighting to basking under for the health of their shells.

[charlesyim]

thanks guys, i was just wondering because i want to take them out the tank just to play with them for a while or let them crawl around my desk when i do some papers

[SpotsMama]

If they're accustomed to you they'd enjoy a time outside the tank exploring. You know they don't like being handeled too much, so you'd basically just put them down and watch them like a hawk as they waddle around.

I don't know about them crawling around on your desk though. They're a whole lot faster than one would imagine and they WILL fall off the edge of the desk and hurt themselves.

[wetchikn]

Spotsmama is SO correct any ideas we learned about turltles being slow were wrong. We once lost one of ours for a short amount of because it moved so quick. Never underestimate the power (or mischief) of your turtle!

[scripta_elegans]

YES! They may be aquatic, but they have no problem being terrestrial for a short time, and my word are they fast! I had the turtles outside the first time this summer, 3 of them, and I put them down, and all three shot off in different dirctions! They were in a big wading pool, but I was really happy I hadn't put them in the grass as I had intended. Those little legs can really scamper!