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hi,
recently everythig i have been feeding my 2 turtles (one yellow bellied terrapin female, and one male florida cooter) has gon to waste. they just will not eat pellet, catfood, veg lettuce etc. they just will not eat them. the only thing they will eat are the black crickets.
can these crickets be used as a staple diet or will this cause problems?
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They do need variety in diet to be healthy. Crickets don't really have any calcium to speak of in them, so if they never eat anything else they're likely to end up with a calcium deficiency.
Are these crickets you're giving them well fed before the turtles eat them? "Gut loading" the live food is a must, the bugs can get a little calcium into them if they're well fed before the turtles eat them.
What pellets have you tried? There are a lot of them on the market now, maybe they'll pick one if you try several brands.
Have you ever tried live feeder guppies or minnows? Live worms, such as earth worms, meal worms, super worms, wax worms or frozen fish food like blood worms thawed out for the turtles to eat? Do you feed these turtles daily? Sometimes if you deny them food for a day or two they'll get hungry enough to try something different.
Let them get hungry then keep trying different things & see what happens. Good luck, finicky turtles can be really frustrating...
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PHRatz
hi. the crickets are gut loaded with "bug grub" its a high calcium suppliment, meant to be used to feed the crickets the calcium, when feeding them to lizards, saves dusting them and having the crickets shake the dust off meaning the lizard gets the correct nutrients.
in the past they have loved the wax worms, but are refusing them as the minute. they have tried the meals but didnt like it when the mealys bit back lol. so are very pickey with them. the moreo's are too big for them yet. They wont eat the lettuce i give them, nor the tomato, cucumber, or sweetcorn.
im in the uk, there arnt alot of turtle feeds ont he market over here. ive tried them on the main 3, the kingbritish, the zoo med aquatic turtle feed, and the T-rex Aquatic turtle feed. all to no avil.
They are fed in a way such as, i will feed on monday, wednesday, thursday, saturday, sunday, tuesday, wednesday.
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I'd think online catalogs would ship to the UK.
You might try ordering some other pellet diets through those.
Just use a search engine & type in the the words reptile supplies & tons of them will come up for you.
I don't recall if you mentioned this but how old are your turtles? Are they still growing?
When mine were growing they would go through what I called growth spurts. When they were in a growth spurt they would eat as if they were starving to death, then when the spurt was over it'd be difficult to get them to eat anything for a little while. Then after a few weeks they'd eat like normal turtles until another growth spurt hit.
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PHRatz
my male cooter is around 3 inches long, the yellow bellied female around 5 inches. so both are still growing.
unknown on ages as i got them when the were dumped on the door step of the petshop where i work. because we dont sell them as people usually do not realise what they are taking on, i decided to take them in myself
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Oy I just reread your post & you say one of them is a cooter.
Try some dandelion greens, turnip greens, squashes, carrots, any of the plants sold for fish aquariums, the cooter might like that.
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PHRatz
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