Reptile & Amphibian Forums

anyone have any good ideas to get box turtles to eat worms lol must be insane to hear this but yes they will not eat them maybe very rarely.butmy one littel guy loves his waxworms tho any thought on live feeding will be helpfull, the whole 9 thanks

>>anyone have any good ideas to get box turtles to eat worms lol must be insane to hear this but yes they will not eat them maybe very rarely.butmy one littel guy loves his waxworms tho any thought on live feeding will be helpfull, the whole 9 thanks

I have 5 box turtles,
I have 2 boxies that will eat roaches,none of the others will touch them. 4 of the 5 turtles will eat earthworms & nightcrawlers, one won't touch. I have 2 that will eat crickets, 3 won't. They all love wax worms, mealies & super worms.
The 5 boxies love fruit 2 will eat grapes, 3 will eat strawberries, 2 won't. 2 will eat cactus berries, 3 won't, all will eat banana, none will eat apples.. I've come to the conclusion that they're just as picky as people can be so I have to just live with it. Big help huh?

Oh when I am able to find them, 2 of them love grub worms.. the rest...nope.
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PHRatz

haha i hear you on that one. My big one is soo picky i have to run away when i feed it bc it will spend 5mins looking around before eating to observe that im not around to watch

>>all will eat banana, none will eat apples..

Haha, my turtles will not go NEAR banana! This is no exaggeration... if the banana is covering any of the other food, they won't even move the banana to eat what's under it. But to top it off - they LOVE apple. Go figure!
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1.0.0 Jack Russel Terrier: Skipper
0.1.0 Miniature Pinscher: Bambi
1.1.1 Eastern Box Turtles: Daisy, Dozer, and Magnum
0.1.0 Red Eared Slider: Rosie
0.2.0 Rats: Clementine and Elsie

I should try again, but in the past none of mine have expressed the slightest interest in either banana OR apple. Plums didn't go over well either.

Berries of any kind are a different story, as is canteloupe. I have a bunch of berryholics here.

Funny how they are about certain foods.

How funny about them being opposite on banana & apple LOL.

I have only one that will eat canteloupe, none will go near watermelon. Plums didn't go over well here either & neither did peaches. Mango.. I bought fresh mango & had to eat it myself, none of them wanted that. LOL
Berries.. they love fresh berries but when I've bought supposedly fresh blackberries or raspberries in the grocery store none of them would eat them. So I tried them myself & didn't like them because I've had fresh before & these didn't taste fresh at all. If I could pick those berries fresh like we do cactus berries they might like them.

When it comes to veggies, with this desert box that's even more difficult.. so far I've not found a veggie that any of them like.
I bought fresh pumpkin recently.. no reaction from the turtles but the tortoise loved it & so did the dog who stole it from the tortoise LOL!
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PHRatz

all of mine love veggies, as for mango woo they inhale that as well. bananas dog food,strawberries havent tried collard greens since they are a summer veg. its official they eat what they like.

7.4.2 Terrapene carolina
4.5 Corallus Caninus
1.0 Geochelone nigra
2.3 Epicrates cenchria

I haven't tried mango yet.
How about greens?
None of mine really seem to go for greens, so I mince the greens into very fine pieces which adhere to other food items, and see to it that they get some.

They do love their slugs, though! When the little ones eat them, it sometimes looks as though their mouths are glued shut temporarily. Yuck!

First and foremost I AM NOT a turtle expert, and I personally like a few. But I may have an advantage in 1 regard is I work at a shop that has done herps from 1966. So we may see more than most people collect.

Years ago when Easterns were allowed they were worm eaters. Also fruits. Now that we are forced to try to get the more western species we find they love more grubs. Kind of makes sense to me. Zoophobias and large meals and recently I have tried silk worms.

Only thing I see constant is nothing! lol They eat what they want, and that may change with the time of year. Much like an iguana I had years ago. He would eat seedless red grapes, but not seeded. No way to tell by looking at them, but he knew somehow.

When our owner gets a few turtles in I gave up on trying to figure it out. I make a samplers platter! Then go from there. They like pinkys too at times. I don't do that, but we had a guy that did.
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Thanks for reading.
Big Tom

www.herpzilla.com

"Only thing I see constant is nothing! lol They eat what they want, and that may change with the time of year."

I agree with you on those points! Mine seem to be more interested in certain foods when they first get active in the spring after coming up from hibernation. They aren't usually interested in fruit at that point. It may be that, since they eat what's available and in season in the wild, if they're kept in a naturalistic setting they continue with those preferences and rhythms somewhat.
Who knows.

I totally agree. Usually if you know the natural foods, and whats available seasonal to them, you can see patterns in captive animals. That iggy I spoke of would eat colorful stuff(anything) in the spring til summer, then just stop.

But then we've all had the garbage disposals. I have 5 birds. My mex double yellow head will eat everything. Others vary greaatly.
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Thanks for reading.
Big Tom

www.herpzilla.com

I have one that will eat mulberries with gusto, 3 that won't touch it. The 3 non-mulberry eaters will all eat earthworms and waxworms, but not pear. The one that won't eat earthworms and waxworms LOVES pear. 2 that will eat banana, 2 that won't. The banana eaters will eat strawberries, but again the other 2 won't.

I won't even go through the vegetables.

>>I won't even go through the vegetables.

LOL I don't blame you!! It gets into too much typing to go through it all doesn't it?

Quirky picky little things aren't they?
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PHRatz

I am amazed at how they can pick out the things they do like and around the things they don't like when you mix them together in a salad!