I forget how I was able to contact the NC Zoo, but this is the reply that I received:



I understand you would like some advice on marking your turtles. We have seen nail polish used on the shell and that seemed to work well. You can also epoxy a label on the shell. The key is to make sure that the product you use does not get hot when applied to a material. Some epoxy will cause a chemical reaction. The other key is to look for a product that dries quickly. We recently used a 5 minute curing epoxy to adhere a transmitter to a box turtle and it did not cure for 48 hours. So a quick 30 second cure time would be preferable. Our vet recently epoxied a dog tag to his tortoise. He said that worked great. Another tip is if this turtle will be outside, try and make the product blend in to the environment. For example bright pink polish might attract attention to the turtle. We would want him or her to become a moving target. To answer your question, I don't think that acrylic paint will harm the turtle however, I am not familiar with this method and do not know what the cure time is for this product. Please email if you have any other questions. Let me know what you used and even send some photos if you would like. I always like to know what other people are doing.



PS the way we mark our turtles does not hurt them. It is similar to filing your nails.
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Patsy

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