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I recently discovered that Res's needs veggies in their diet. So I intruduced Romaine Lettuce to my turtle. He won't eat it. I introduced carrots instead. He liked those. I also fed him celery, he liked it, but then I realized there is little nutritional value in it. I fed him grapes, and he liked it, but I learned not to feed him too much fruit. Is it okay if his only veggies are carrots and celery? Or how can I make him start eating the lettuce? These are the only veggies I have available at all times. Thanks for your help!

Carrots are one of the veggies that shouldn't be overfed, but within a well-balanced diet they are fine. Carrots contain a lot of sugar. Try leafy lettuces such as romaine, green-leaf and red-leaf. Some grocery stores carry dandelion leaves which are good as well. Maybe soaking the leaf of lettuce in the water from some tuna might help to get him started on it. Sometimes as owners we find ourselves in the situation of having to withhold the foods that our turtles will eat/love to eat in order to get them to eat the things they should. Keep trying the lettuces and he will eventually learn they are to eat. Don't reinforce his behavior by only giving him what he wants to eat immediately after him not eating what he should, also.

I'd stay away from the celery since it doesn't contain any nutrition and is only a filler.

I think my RES have a preference with Red Leaf lettuce over Romaine. I think the darker color makes it a bit more interesting for them.

Sonyj, I took your advice and soaked the lettuce in tuna juice. He chewed it up a bit, but then spit it out. What a little booger! I guess it just needs time! Thanks for the advice!

I'll look into the Red Leaf Lettuce and see if he likes that.

Sometimes it looks like they are spitting it out...it took mine a few days to get the grasp of eating it. It looked like all they were doing was biting it and spitting it out. Keep trying!

I wouldn't feed carrots really often (like daily/every other day), not because they have a high sugar content (I'm not sure how high it really is and grapes are higher), but because they have a somewhat high oxalic acid content (which can prevent the absorption of calcium in the diet). Carrots do contain beta carotene, which a turtle can use to synthesize Vit A, however, and this is good. I give my turtles carrot peels about weekly as part of their diet. And, it depends on how much the turtle is being given (one peel? 5 peels? etc.) as to how often they are offered.

My turtles prefer red leaf over the other types of lettuce mentioned because of it's color (they like a number of reddish colored foods) and because it's more tender than romaine (given a choice they always go for the most tender leaves). Nutrition-wise, dandelions are the best of the leafy greens. And the celery doesn't really have any nutrition and has a fairly high salt content.

marisa wrote:I wouldn't feed carrots really often (like daily/every other day), not because they have a high sugar content (I'm not sure how high it really is and grapes are higher), but because they have a somewhat high oxalic acid content (which can prevent the absorption of calcium in the diet). Carrots do contain beta carotene, which a turtle can use to synthesize Vit A, however, and this is good. I give my turtles carrot peels about weekly as part of their diet. And, it depends on how much the turtle is being given (one peel? 5 peels? etc.) as to how often they are offered.

My turtles prefer red leaf over the other types of lettuce mentioned because of it's color (they like a number of reddish colored foods) and because it's more tender than romaine (given a choice they always go for the most tender leaves). Nutrition-wise, dandelions are the best of the leafy greens. And the celery doesn't really have any nutrition and has a fairly high salt content.

Are red bell peppers good for them? Once a week?

I feed a variety of the colored bell peppers every so often...it is part of a diet including the dark greens though. I don't devote a days feeding just to the peppers, but throw in a few lettuce leaves or dandelions.

missibsu wrote:I feed a variety of the colored bell peppers every so often...it is part of a diet including the dark greens though. I don't devote a days feeding just to the peppers, but throw in a few lettuce leaves or dandelions.

I just tried to give her some red bell peppers with her red leaf and romaine lettuce and she seemed scared of it! Or at least not interested at all.

The first time I offer anything new, they seem to turn their noses up at it. After they eat everything else and they get bored, they will usually go back to it and eat it.

Depends on the turtle too, maybe yours just doesn't like it. Just don't give up too quickly.

Yay, Rush's eating romaine lettuce now! The tuna soaking worked, and a lot faster than I expected too.

Rush wrote:I recently discovered that Res's needs veggies in their diet. So I intruduced Romaine Lettuce to my turtle. He won't eat it. I introduced carrots instead. He liked those. I also fed him celery, he liked it, but then I realized there is little nutritional value in it. I fed him grapes, and he liked it, but I learned not to feed him too much fruit. Is it okay if his only veggies are carrots and celery? Or how can I make him start eating the lettuce? These are the only veggies I have available at all times. Thanks for your help!

Get creative. Cut up the veggies small & add some tiny bits of chicken or fish or some canned cat food so the turtle can "smell" the food.

After doing this over the period of a week, my turtle finally got used to those veggies I was feeding her! It really works. You just have to get creative to get them to eat certain veggie foods (obviously this won't work for fruits!).

I feed bits of red bell peppers every week to two weeks (depends on if I have them on hand). They're fine as part of the over all diet. The sugar content is higher, but they do contain beta carotene as well.

how should the carrots be cut when you're feeding it to a turtle?

my mom cut it into tiny pieces and dropped them into the tank. i'm not sure if my turtle ate them but it was a pain to clean the tank...

can turtles choke on swallowing tiny pieces of carrots or other hard veggies/fruits??

You should take a vegetable peeler and sliver the carrots into long thin strings (sort of like flat worms). It's much easier for your turtle to eat them the thinner they are.