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Hello to all.

I'm a newbie here.
My problem is my RES don't eat cuttle bone. I never saw my RES took any interest of the bite size cuttle bone that I left floating in the water. After a week, I ground the cuttle bone and spread it on his floating sticks. That's the only way I can make him take the cuttle bone. But it's tiring. Do you have any suggestion on how to make him take the cuttle bone? Thanks in advance.

This is just my guess: keep offering cuttlebone in varying sizes and the turtle will
eat cuttlebone when it feels the need to. Hatchling usually doesn't need cuttlebone
yet, only good pellets (like Reptomin) and a little taste of vegetables.

Continue offering cuttlebone, and he'll eventually take to it. Turtles are designed to go after cuttlebone when they really need it (for instance, a female about to lay eggs can go through several cuttlebones in a week's time).

You can supplement the diet by feeding veggies high in calcium, I don't remember which ones are, but check the forums.

If it gets really bad, to the point that it's be 6+ months with no calcium intake besides veggies and pellets, I would recommend the turtle shots, just don't add all of the other stuff in, just do some meat juice, gelatin, and calcium powder and feed a small chunk every so often.

Hi to all, thanks for the prompt reply. I guess I just have to maintain my present method of having the cuttle bone grounded and then spread it on the turtle food. I also left a bite size cuttle bone floating. Thanks again.

When I first introduced cuttlebone to my RES, she just avoided it. I left it in the tank for several days and she eventually took some bites. Just keep trying.

Thanks for all the infos. I handfed one of my turts with very small cuttlebone and he/she took it.