Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I was wondering if I could put my Red-Eared turtles in the water with my fish in a 55 gallon tank? I have a floating island, I know it would be big enough, I mean I bought the bigger one at the store... But anyways can the turtle go in the tank with a floating island, I have no aggressive fish in the tank, all I have mainley is stuff they'll eat like goldfish, minnows, rosy reds, and plateys?

You would have to reduce your water level and be still have a basking and heat lamp over the floating island (which would have to be mounted in one spot and not allowed to float freely in the tank.)

Also you will most likely lose some fish as the turtle may decide to eat them.

Steve

The best fish to have with your turtle are fish that are as large or larger than your turtle. I keep native sunfish from the same pond the turtles are found in. As for lowering the water level, I dont reccomend it. Build a canopy hood so your turtle wont escape, but he will still have room to bask. instead of a floating island, try something that will sit on the lip of the top of the aquarium.

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iturnrocks.com

I agree! I think turtles love deep water; they feel more secure that way. When ever there is danger, they fled into water.

>> As for lowering the water level, I dont reccomend it. Build a canopy hood so your turtle wont escape, but he will still have room to bask. instead of a floating island, try something that will sit on the lip of the top of the aquarium.

My mail ordered turtle dock got here & when it did I was finally able to raise that water level in the new 55g tank for the painted.
He now has the deepest water level he's ever had because now he can have that. He looks very happy. I've watched him floating with his head out of the water like he could do if he was in a pond, I just know he likes this much better than what he used to have.
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PHRatz

I have a 10 year old RES (Harvey) that eats about 10 fish a month. I have introduced fish to the tank with the hope that maybe he might not eat all of them. Once he allowed a feeder fish to grow rather large and as soon as I thought he was too big for Harvey to eat, he became his lunch. If you want fish in the tank with your RES, I would never expect for them to live.

All the suggestions above are great, I just wanna add that depending on how agressive your turtle is it might chew up the fins of even a larger fish.
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1.0 African Fat-tailed Gecko (Mike)
0.1 Leopard Gecko (super hypo tang - Autumn)
1.1 Red Ear Slider (Dirk The Daring and Iria)
2.0 Cats (Scruffy and Sonic)
3.7 Dogs (husky mutts ; one wolf/german shepard hybred)
Salt and Fresh water fish

Yes, we have some minnows in with our turtles. And like everyone else said, fish are turtle food so dont get too attached to the fish.

And snails! Our baby turts love them snails! Like the best darn treat they ever had.