My 4 yr old RES suddenly grabbed a slightly younger one today and pushed him down to the bottom of the pond, holding him there. I think the big one had the hind leg of the younger one, and soon the big one's whole head was down in the younger one's shell! I always thought the big one was female. She meant business! Does anyone know why she would do this? (they live in an outside 1000 gal pond all year)
I can only guess that the big one is a female, since I'm no expert and the smaller one a male. I noticed the differences several years ago based on the sexing rules I could find online. There is one even smaller one (only 8 mo old ) but already 4 inch in the pond also. Since she lost part of her tail as a hatchling it is difficult to tell, but I believe female also. The big one did finally let the smaller one go, and no damage was done that I could see. He was kind of holding his leg in a little, but soon after was swimming and using it just fine. These turtles live in my backyard koi/fish pond. It is a fenced in yard about 1 acre, but not meant to keep turtles in. They just stay so far. The big one actually disappeared for 1 week and returned the other day. She has been walking around the pond more, going up higher to bask, and just moving about her territory more lately, completely out of the pond area sometimes. We count heads before we mow the yard! I noticed they are starting to get cramped on their favorite basking rock. I put a flatter rock out further in the pond years ago when the first bigger turtle went out there. It sits up higher out of the water, we call it turtle rock. The big one has moved to another one altogether now, even though she has used the one rock for years, while the two smaller ones take turtle rock. Could this be some territory issues going on?

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