Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hey folks, it's me again.
My RES hatchling, theresa, who I've had for about 2 1/2 months has not been eating well.She hates pellets and loves the shrimp, but won't eat veggies at all.I was starting to get worried because she had not grown at all since I got her, where as the other RES I got with her has tripled in size (JOHN) and is bordering on morbidly obese.He is the Walter Hudson of RES.

So I bought ten little rosie reds last night and put them in the tank after I finished cleaning it.I figured there was no way they were going to be able to catch them, and the fish were likely to starve before being eaten. And I will never know if my theory was correct because I came back a few hours later to find that they had ALL DIED(presumably from the temperature shock-didn't think about that).However, I did find theresa decapitating and devouring one, which was a score.Unfortunately it was the last one, and the other 9 had been eaten already.

Now before anyone starts yacking, I know this is way too much food.It will never happen again.Experiment gone bad.End of story.
SO anyways, I get up this morning and the whole room smelled like there was a corpse rotting in there.Like if you went on vacation in july and somebody hid dead fish around the house kind of smell.I don't even want to think about touching that tank with out a HAZMAT suit on.

My question to you is this;Is this going to happen every time I put feeder fish in there? How can I prevent the abominable stench permiating from that room? It smells like a seafood fart bomb went off in there.Do I need a better filter? Right now I have a Fluval cannister filter.

Thanks.
...Anne
2 RES hatchlings (Theresa and John)
1 anklebiter (16 months)

what size tank are they in? the more water you have the longer it will take to get nasty. and there is no such thing as overkill on turtle filters. get the biggest external canister filter you can afford. i have a 30 gallon tank and i'm running a fluval 304 filter (rated for a 70 gallon tank)when i was doing my set-up i came across an article that had filter comparisons for fish vs. turtle tanks that i found pretty helpfull. i'm not sure, but i think it was at www.austinsturtlepage.com if i can find it i'll post a link. also i use a product called biotize. it is supposed to break down turtle waste. it works pretty good for me my tank is usually pretty clean and i haven't had any problems with smell.
mabey you should check your filter for fish guts. i had a dwarf frog get sucked up in a fish tank filter once, and that caused a nasty odor. if thats what happened you can buy a small filter sponge, cut a hole in it, and fit it over the intake of your filter. that worked for me. it also works as an additional layer of filtration (screening out large debris before they enter the main filter)
as far as your small turtle, i would not worry as long as she eats normally. i had one grow a lot faster than the other and the small one caught up in a few months. if you are worried about the other one hogging all the food before she gets a chance remove him for a little while and let her have first dibs on the food, when she is done let him pig out. you can also try planting anachris in the tank. mine go crazy for it, and they are not big on green veggies. as for live feeders, ghost shrimp are a great. i've used them alot and never noticed any bad smell when they were eaten. wow, i didn't mean to write such a long post,hope this helps some. good luck with your turts! michele

here is that link
Link

I've put in half a dozen rosies in my tank, thinking there's no way he would catch them. After a week they were all gone. I found no smell or mess left behind. I also have (I think) a 30 gallon tank and two filters in it. I clean it out completely every other week. Maybe next time put in only a couple fish and see what happens.