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I just read a posting earlier about tank size so I think my question is basically answered...but I have 2 turtles, they are about 3 1/2 inches long each. I have them in a 20 gallon tank with about 16 gallons of water in it and a 4"x12" basking area. I am going to start building them a pond but it will not be ready until May or June. They seem like they have plenty of room and are as happy as can be. I guess I should have them in an 80 gallon though. With fish, I know it is 1 gallon for ever inch of fish...so it is really 10 gallons for every inch of turtle? I can't believe the guy who sold me the turtles told me they'd be ok in a 3 gallon untill they were 6 months old! Dang does he needs some educating (for selling them) He also said they would not reach 4 inches, until they were 3 years old. They are not even a year and they are already alomost 4 inches. Any replies are appreciated. Thanks. :lol

In my opinion, if all other needs are met, space is secondary. Now, I'm not saying it's ok if the turtles have no room to swim and have to stack on top of eachother to bask or anything like that. I kept my 2 5in res in a 50gal until I moved and was able to give them something MUCH larger. If your plans are in the works and you know it won't take longer than May or June, they'll be fine.

Btw, if you're going to the trouble of building a pond, go as big as you can. That way if you want to add more turtles/fish/plants they'll all fit.

And yes, it really is 10gal per inch

I also had a question on if you can keep koi in the same pond as RES. Will the RES try to eat the koi or vise versa? I have always wanted a koi pond I love to watch the TUrtles and fishes activity. Thanks.

Your turtles will tear them apart. Maybe not at first, but it will happen sooner or later.

Yikes!!! Ok....I wonder if I could make like a 400 gallon pond...Or so and put some type of Divider in the middle that the turtles could not climb like tall plexi glass or mesh hardware or even like a bridge for us to walk across that was tall enough they could not climb or cross. who knows... Do you think it would make them too crazy trying to get what they knew was on ther other side? Should I just build 2 ponds?

They will climb over a vertical mesh fence. They climb like monkeys. A plexiglass divider might work. A footbridge that they couldn't cross sounds really neat. Could be pretty too.

Yeah, that is what I was thinking.