New RES not eating

[kinnadian]

I'm a beginner turtle keeper, I've kept fish for a couple years and understand all aspects of keeping aquariums and such.

I got a small 1-1.5" RES a week ago (3 months old), and I've heard/read many places that it's easiest to feed them in a separate container (to reduce mess and monitor how much they are eating) so I tried him once a day and he would never eat anything. I tried making the water hotter or colder than his normal tank, and I've tried putting excess or no light on the container too. In his tank (it's a 120L tank) he spends his whole time hiding, sitting in a corner with all his legs in and being inactive. I've tried dropping turtle pellets in to his tank but they just get waterlogged and then break apart, and I never see him eating them.

My tank was originally river-rock substrate but I have since replaced it with sand substrate (since river rock was impossible to clean lol). I have two heaters as it gets quite cold over night, and with the two going it maintains 25 overnight and 26-27 during the day. I've got a 600L/hr external canister filter (it's not fully established, but have been using that Cycle stuff), UVB fluoro bulb and a basking area with a 20W halogen light (and got the temperature of the basking rock good, between 30 and 32... but he NEVER uses this anyways). Basically I'm saying I have everything right for him, I'm pretty sure.

I tried putting in some real plants amongst the fake plants and have seen him nibble at them sometimes I think. In the tank with him is various little cichlids that don't give him any trouble, and a couple bristlenose.

I just got another turtle this morning (he is bigger, but only 2 months old... so I'm thinking my one is a runt?), this one is extremely active, swims around and has even had a short basking session today. I haven't tried feeding him yet but I've seen him go after some cichlid pellets. With the second turtle in the tank now, the first one seems more secure and hangs out with the new turtle and doesn't hide quite as much.

Alright. So my question is, how do I encourage my turtle to start eating food? It's been a week now almost and he must be starving. Apart from my nitrites being non-zero (ammonia is 0) there is nothing wrong with his enclosure. Should I just drop pellets in to the tank and hope they find them? (cichlids drag them into their hidey holes and then leave them). Should I buy more real plants (or steal some from my other tanks) and put them in there? I have pellets, flake, the frozen turtle food from animates, dried brine shrimp, breeder guppies (though he is too small to eat them at the moment), and various other fish foods.

[DonnaM]

Hes probably stressed. He's gone into a new environment and he's then picked up and put into another container on a regular basis while hes still insecure in his new home. Sometimes a turtle can take a week or two or even longer to adjust to new surroundings and feel confident to eat. Personally I would leave him in the tank to feed him for now. Drop a hot-house cube in front of him and leave him be. Unfortunately now that you have 2, its likely the more secure, bigger, active one will dominate the tank and the food. You may need to remove the bigger one out to allow the other to eat. Definately pop plenty of live plants in there. He can hide in them and eat them when he wants. Putting a piece of sponge around the intake strainer of your filter will stop all the plant bits going into your filter, but you need to clean the sponge regularly. Have you got plenty of places in the tank for him to hide and feel safe?

[Insect Direct]

try and find out what it was previously eating. stubborn hatclings often like frozen bloodworms.

sand is very questionable. cant beat a bare bottom tank for monitoring whats going on and keeping water pristine.

they can be very shy when young. i wouldnt bother trying to feed in a saparate container until it is eating on its own and with confidence. even then if you have a good filter i dont see the point. just causes stress for the animal moving it around.

try not to disturb it too much while settling in. maybe cover the sides of the tank with a towel for a week or two. it wont bask if disturbed too often.

once they start to trust you and associate you with food things change rather fast

[kinnadian]

The bigger one is only slightly bigger, we're talking maybe 10-15% more. They don't show signs of aggression towards each other .

I have quite a few fake plants that he hides in but have definitely thought about putting live plants in. Is there something cheaper (eg vegetables) that will last that I could use instead/as well as?

There is a big bit of wood in the corner which has a lot of hiding space behind it, but since I got the new one the old one doesn't seem to hide very often anymore. Because there is a lot of visual stimulus in the tank, I am worried about where to put the frozen food.

The breeder said he is feeding it "bloodworms, oxygen weed, waterfleas, boatman daphnia dried fish small bits meat dried fish.. fresh fish ." So a very meat-intensive diet. I have frozen bloodworms for my fish, should I try some of that along with the frozen turtle food?

The sand is to make the tank look nicer, I've never been a fan of bare-bottom turtle tanks as they look quite boring. Once the turtles grow up and I have to put them in to their own bigger tank I will probably go for something like that.

Thanks for the comments guys. I was just worried that it has been so long and he hasn't eaten yet. I'll try just feeding him in the tank and hoping the cichlids don't eat it all, and now that he has a friend he seems a lot more secure.

[Insect Direct]

i would just drop a cube of bloodworms in. maybe poke with a stick to try an attract turtle eyes to the food.

remove any uneaten food after 5 minutes

they hardly eat greens when young. duckweed is good as it floats and if feeding floating pellets for example they cant avoid eating some of the duckweed. gives them a little bit of cover which they seem to like. http://www.youtube.com/user/nzexotics#p/u/20/uYPoCLljj5g

could bump the temp up slightly to 28C. once the turtle has been settled & eating well for atleast a couple of weeks drop back down to 25/26C.

Fish could be adding stress to the turtle. bns are nocturnal (i think) so could be disturbing the turtles at night. bns have nice barbs too.

[Bellshill Belgians]

Weighing the small turtles is quite useful to check they are gaining weight. I weigh all of my hatchlings every 2 weeks to ensure they are gaining weight. I also find sometimes with shyer babies they will start to feed if you help them by waving very small pieces in front of their faces using small tweezers.

Bloodworms are great but may be messy in all but a bare bottom tank, it is especially hard to siphon off sand. I usually use a bare bottom tank until my young turtles are feeding well, then go for river stones (too big to eat).

I wouldn't remove them to feed in a separate tank as this will likely stress and frighten them more.

Good luck,

Joanne

[Squirt]

And just a heads up turtles need 40L per 2.5cm so 2x12(30/2.5)x40=960L :L that doesn't sound right well it's 1" per 10g so idk Preferably a 600L + for both o them when older and turtles do get very aggressive to one another. good luck!

[kinnadian]

Just an update, my newer turtle eats to his hearts content. I've seen the older (smaller) turtle eat maybe once.

I put a small hothouse cube right infront of his face while he was hiding in some fake plants, after 15 minutes he hadn't even touched it. I've had him 9 days now... I still think he is a runt or something (if reptiles can get runts, lol), since he is quite a bit smaller than the new turtle but is 1 month older.

Apart from just regularly putting food in front of his face, and otherwise not bugging him often, there isn't anything I can do until he gets settled is there?

[repto]

when I first started with turtle breeding years back,I would feed them live daphinia and mosquito larvae,mysis shrimp etc anything that was moving was brilliant,daphnia especially had an action that seemed to attract their attention.As the breeding method was sorted and bigger numbers of babies needed feeding live food became harder to get in the quantities required so I just did away with it and used reptomin floating pellets which you could see little bite marks out of.Once a few start eating the others soon catch on and I also used to run the temp at 30 or so which got them going.To change them from live food to still can often be a problem especially if you have a shy one.Just persevere and have food in there if it wants it.I would not say it was a runt as such yet,but if it does not start to find an appetite it could well end up to be one.