Reptile & Amphibian Forums

ive noticed that one of my turtles is being picked on...everytime she goes on the turtle dock, the male comes up and bites her in the legs! freakin aye! in order it break it apart i gotta stick my hand and seperate em. i have a 10 gallon tank.its kinda small for them and im thinkin its cause the male is territorial? the female doesnt seem to be taking any injury tho. its as if the male is teasing it... theyve been together for 4-5 years and theyve never fought. why, they grew up together! so should i get a bigger tank? i wudev done it sooner but budget is low...

wow.. i dont even know where to start with this one... first off, if your turtles are 4-5 years old, this means they must be about 4-5 inches long... they should DEFINITELY be in a MUCH LARGER tank than a 10 gallon. is that even enough room for them to move around in?? mine are in like a 40 gallon tank, and they are only like 1.5 inches each! the 'general rule of thumb' is 10 gallons of water PER INCH of turtle... and although most ppl dont follow this, it should be CLOSE to this regulation!

second of all, the best thing you could do for your turtles is to first get a new tank so that they have room to move around, but second of all, if the biting gets worse, separate them! you wouldnt want one of your turtles to end up getting severly hurt by the other. this would mean vet costs, which would be A LOT more than just a simple 50 gallon tub from wal mart.

but as a side note, they could be mating. im not THAT sure of the mating rituals because my turtles are so young yet... but im sure someone else could answer that for you!
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~ Evie

Pets:
RIP 0.1.0 German Shepherd {Dusty}
0.1.0 German Shepherd/Collie mix {Shadoe}
0.0.2 RES turtles {Booger & Snot}
1.0.0 African Clawed Frog {Bingo}
0.0.2 Snail {Gary & Larry}

wow so the male gets frisky? crazy....anyway guess ill be working my way to get that tank....=/

but does the small tank explain why the male keeps biting the female? everytime he bites he like hangs on but doesnt bite hard enough to do extreme damage. he just startles her. and he only does it when the female is on the dock. after the jerk lets go, the female keeps her feet inside and stares him down. he backs off after that. and a couple minutes later her feet are out with no damage. i really wanna know if this happens cuz the male wants to mate or hes just being a total jerk. anyone have any ideas and has this happened to anyone else?

if you look back in this forum, i know there are MANY posts where people have said that their one turtle is more aggressive than the other. and yes,it could be caused by the 'cramped' conditions that these turtles are obviously living in. but it could also be caused by the male being a 'jerk'. so your best bet is to either separate them now OR get a bigger tank and see how they react with each other before taking extreme measures and separating them. some people have had to separate their turtles for life because they HAVE caused major damage to each other... so my best advice would be to at least separate them while they are in that very small tank until you get a bigger one. then after that it's up to you whether you want to try and put them back together and see how things go, or keep them separated forever.
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~ Evie

Pets:
RIP 0.1.0 German Shepherd {Dusty}
0.1.0 German Shepherd/Collie mix {Shadoe}
0.0.2 RES turtles {Booger & Snot}
1.0.0 African Clawed Frog {Bingo}
0.0.2 Snail {Gary & Larry}

He is not trying to mate with the female. Do you know for sure that one is male and one is female?
He is agressive because of the small tank. Turtles are territorial and when there isn't enough space they want it all to themselves. You HAVE to seperate them TODAY! Go to Walmart and get two 50 gal plastic tubs. They are cheap and will house each turtle until you can save for a bigger tank. If you want to keep them together in the same tank you have to save for a tank at LEAST 120 gals if one is really a girl. Girls get bigger than boys so she will need more room. You may find that they will never be able to live together because sometimes turtles are just agressave because they are agressave not because of space. I had to give three of my painteds up because of this. One had part of her tail bitten off and that was my wake up call. If you want to keep them seperate get two tanks but remember the 10 gals of water per 1 inch of turtle. Also remember if your turtle is 5 inches they need 50 gals of WATER, not a 50 gal tank. Unless you are going to build the basking area over the tank and fill it all the way up, you will need at least a 55 gal tank for 50 gals of water.
I hope all goes well and your turtles decide to get along after all so they can live together forever. Keep us updated on their progress. Don't forget a heat lamp, and a UVB/UVA bulb. If you go with the tubs until you can afford a bigger tank, I would suggest some kind of floating basking area for each because it's hard to attach a basking area to a plastic tub.

I agree with all of the above. how large are your turtles? You need to move them immediately before you cause permanant stunting damage. I hope you have enough room for both of them because, like was already said, if one is a female you are looking at a huge tank. Females get massive, my friends 14inch female is about to move out of her 75g into the next biggest size he can get. If you can not get a bigger home for your turtles i would suggest giving them to someone who can.

and also agreeing with the above, they are probably fighting because of the cramped space.

thanks for the replies. i guess ill be working hard these next few weeks....cuz im kinda still 16 and still cant seem to get a job....i never could figure out which one is female. but i assumed they had to be different sex because one of em kept doin the courtship dance for a couple of days. so i thot that one was the male and the was of course female....unless my turtle was confused....

My turltes are both males and they do the mating ritual to each other.
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The males have really long claws. The females have short little nubby claws. That is the eaiest way to tell.

If they are still small enough at 4-5 years to fit in a 10 gallon aquarium they are stunted already and will never reach normal size.

I don't know about RES's but my painted belonged to my best friend before me and he lived in a 10 gal tank with just a couple inches of water for a year and a half and stayed the same size and then I moved him to a 20 gal for about two more years and he got just a couple inches bigger. So I assumed his growth was stunted but now he is in a 90 gal and is full grown and healthy.
Since a RES is bigger than a painted I assume these RES's will have internal problems because of the cramping but I also assume that their shells can grow to full length if put into bigger tanks now.
As far as the cost, even a 16 year old can afford two 50 gal tubs from Walmart. You won't regret it. When you get a job you can put a little aside each paycheck and save for a huge tank. And even big tanks can be found cheap so don't think you have to buy one from somewhere like PetsMart because they are a rip off. Check your local paper, yard sales, flea markets and hand me down stores till you find a cheap tank. My 90 gal tank with oak stand was only $100 (I tell everyone it was $100 but my husband said we only paid $90, so I guess I'm wrong lol). Anyway my point is, you will be able to afford better care for them.

thanks for the inspiration. looks like ill be gettin those tubs until i save up enuff to get a much bigger tank. thanks for all the advice.

really? they wont grow anymore? aw man....well...is that a bad thing that they wont reach normal size? does it shorten their life span er sumthin? are u seriously sure that happens? cuz my friend has one too and he kept it in a 10 gallon. but that was only one. the only thing he did different was load that thing with so much protein it grew so big that it seriously has no place to swim anymore! i gave my turts greens and protein once a week. i told him that its bad but he doesnt do anything....so sad....my two babies jay and silent bob still have a little room to swim in the tank tho...but i know i shud be getting a bigger one. the female is jay...ionno if i shud leave it at that cuz jay sounds more like a guy....

i got a bigger tank. got the money. anyway....no luck....that one turtle is still biting the other one's leg. should i buy another dock er sumthing? cuz thats wen that one turtle decides to bite her. please help me! i want them to live together. i dont wanna have to give one away....=(