General Care Discussion :: Do female res have eggs in them, but just keep them in there

[Meta]

Like could my res have small eggs in her for like a long time and just never know they r there? i saw dissection pics of a turtle and there were small eggs in there.

[Meta]

i dont make much sense, i mean, could a premature or undready res be holdin small egss for years until she is bigger and eggs r bigger and rdy to lay

[blackforces get you]

i dont think thats possible. they usually lay their eggs in the warmer season. and they would know. they will show signs of stress and try to get out of the tank to lay them. so, if it tries to get out or acts strange then you might have a fertile turtle there

[TheComputerGremlin]

I do not believe that the female holds on to eggs for a long period of time. When the female is getting ready to lay, she will consume a lot of cuttlebone, to replenish her store of calcium from producing the eggs. Some turtles simply never lay eggs. The only time to worry is if she exhibits signs that she's gravid and never lays, then you want to get to a vet to confirm the eggs and have her induced. Females don't usually start laying eggs until they are 2-3 years old and 5 or so inches long; the smaller the turtle, the eggs also tend to be smaller and may be laid in the water and taken into the filter; and also, females kept around males tend to lay more eggs (even if they are separated by a screen), probably implicating pheromones as the culprit.

[steve]

You are speaking of egg retention. http://redearslider.com/reproduction.html

[Meta]

my turtle is 9 yrs old 6 inches, never laid

[Spookster]

Your turtle is 9 years old and only 6 inches?

[Meta]

Your turtle is 9 years old and only 6 inches?

the first 6 years of its life it was living in the little buckets they sell them in at the flea markets ...with no lights, basking, and just an inch of water. it might be 8 years actually. i stink at countin this

[megcornell]

The fact that your turtle lived such an awful first few years is likely why it isn't laying eggs now.
It was so deprived that it was stunted physically and probably reproductively as well. In nature, reproduction is sort of a luxury in the sense that animals who are barely getting by will stop reproducing a lot of the time. It makes evolutionary "sense" because if the parent animal can hardly survive why would it waste so much energy to make the babies.
So, your turtle might never lay eggs or it might start laying them much later than the average female. But, your turtle isn't hanging on to pre-formed eggs that it's had for years. You would be seeing serious symptoms if your turtle had eggs just waiting around and rotting inside of her.

Do take a moment though and look at the reproduction link steve attached in his response. It gives the symptoms of a gravid or pregnant turtle so you can see what to watch for when and if your turtle does lay eggs.