Hi all,
I'm new here and came in since I have a slight concern. I have two red-eared sliders that are roughly one year old. After some research, I believe my larger one to be female (Smyth) and the other male (Wes). Some behavior background:
- Wes has absolutely no problem basking when I'm around and will typically only dive into the water when he's hungry, swimming towards me for food. Smyth will occasionally bask with Wes with no issue, but still panics and dives into the water when she notices me (sometimes causing Wes to dive a second or two later).
- Both of them will swim towards me when hungry but will sometimes retreat for a few seconds if they have their heads out of the water and notice my hand about to drop in some pellets.
- I use feeder rings for fish so that the pellets don't float all over the place and to attempt making their lives easier when feeding and it seems that they've gotten used to looking towards the rings for their food.
- Outside of feeding, they seem to have no issue at all living with each other. Their tank is heated throughout most of the day, potentially over-filtered (90 GPM filter in a 10 gallon tank), and their water is treated with multiple aquatic water treatments (i.e. anti-chlorine, food/waste breakdown bacteria, ReptoGuard health conditioner).
The issue I'm having is that Wes typically follows Smyth to whichever ring she is using, usually not realizing that there's more food a few inches away. Smyth often times will try to push Wes away when she's aiming for her target pellet(s) (often times pushing his face). Smyth can sometimes gorge two pellets at a time and make quick work of them while Wes occasionally struggles with just one. Wes doesn't seem to be growing all that fast while Smyth seems to be growing noticeably pretty quickly. I'm no expert of course, but I also often see her with, what I think, is lots of skin shedding on her limbs and shell. Smyth does seem to get full after a while so there should be plenty for Wes to eat.
Should I start separating the two when it comes time to feed? (They don't really care for being handled just yet). Should I separate them into different tanks in general?
Sorry for the long thread but I'd like to have as much context out there as possible while waiting for a response. These turtles are also new to me since my mom had to give them up and nobody else was willing to take over their healthcare given the startup costs for proper RES habitats.