Reptile & Amphibian Forums

i just got a few questions for anyone who is kind enough to respond. i am looking to build a pond and currently have 9 turtles. my concern is how large should these turtles be to be safe from predators such as raccoons and birds which are abundant where i live? most of my turtles are snappers except a couple of redears and spiny softshell. they are all between 6- 8 inches and have outgrown my 150 gallon tank in less than a year!! i would rather invest in a pond than buy more tanks or whatever. also what size pond long term would be sufficient? i have plenty of room and also have a fenced yard. i figure that i'll probably have to enclose the pond overhead at least until they get larger. any help or suggestions would be appreciated.

Hey, you will likely need a fairly large pond, I'm not sure exactly how large.. One reccomendation though, do not keep the snapping turtle and softshell with the rest of your turtles if you are currently doing so, these 2 species are both very aggressive andculd harm your other turtles.. They should have separate enclosures to themselves (don't mix even the snapper with the stfostell). If you already knew this,sorry for reminding you, if not, separate them immediately before something happens... Good luck in your pond search as well, it is a great idea to have them outside if the weather permits it.

Matt

make two separate pond if you can as mentioned before and make them as big as possible. They aren't gonna complain with more room. Plus, make sure you have plenty of room for all you snappers so that they don't fight. Be sure to include a land area too, cuz they will come out sometimes.

thanks guys but what about the safe size for these animals outdoors and do you think i need to screen or cage the top from these large birds and potentially racoons? i am not to excited about roofing it mainly because of appearance but i certainly don't want to endanger my turtles. thanks

depends how big they are, i dont remember you giving us the size of your turtles. Im sure nothing is gonna eat ur 20lb. snapper in the pond. if theyre small tho, like babies, then i would screen it from herons and so forth. if u use something temporary, then you could remove it when they are big enough.

oops, of course i missed it. Umm at that size I prolly would still cuz i love my turtles like that, but someone else might have a different opinion and know more bout housing them outside.

As far as predators,
I believe it has more to do with depth.
The turtles are pretty wary.
But a racoon will go into shallow water. They don't like it , but they will.
Mkae sure you have a lot of the pong over 24 inches deep and even deeper in som elarger areas.
The turtles will be fine.
They will naturally go deep when predators are around and a racoon will never go into deeper water.
( Thats what I was told by a naturalist anyway)

thanks guys for all the advice! i'm still a few months away from getting started on this project and will probably build 2 large ponds because i plan on adding more turtles to my collection.