okami789

my dad found a baby black snapping turtle in the woods about a week ago. the poor li'll guy was 200 ft away from the stream he was searching for and heading the wrong way. he was so utterly lost that we decided to take him in. i came home fom school and i find him in an ice box ~ there was nowhere else to put him at the time. me and my sister named him Raphael (from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles), then gave him the middle name "tuttle" just because that was the first thing that crossed our minds. we gave him olur last name too, an we're calling him Ralphie for short. after a few miserable days in the cooler for Ralphie (sll he had in there was a rock and a leaf) my dad finally decided to drag out the ol' tank and stock it with all those silky-planty-fakey-wakey thingamajigies. after setting it up and filling it, he poured in all these chemicals (the bottles said Ammo-Lock and Stress Coat and stuffs) he waited a few hours, then put Ralphie in and let him make himself at home. after a few more days of horrible boringness for Ralphie (and for us, too Ralphie does basically NOTHING) my dad put more chemicals in, put 2 plastic bags full of fish (6 red neon tetras, 6 guppies {one preggers}, 2 baby albino corys) in the tank, still in the bags. we let them get used to their new home, then opened the bags and let them out. by now they were more used to their surroundings and temperature and started to explore. we all thought that Ralphie would gobble them all up immediately, but suprisingly, he just got all scared and freaked out and hid in his corner.after a while he seemed to realize that there were fish, but mostly ignored them. a cory went up to him and nibbled some dirty stuff off his tail, but he ignored it and the cory went away. then a guppy flicked its tail in his face and he also ignored it. after an hour or so, the cory came back and flounced around in his face and i guess he got a bit angry 'cause he rammed his head into the cory's body. it wasn't too hard and he didn't bite,but still.... would he eat them? also, anyone who knows what to feed Ralphie and how exactly how to take care of him ~ PLZ HELP! anyone with tips, thx, too.

Gouramiguy17

I was close to having a snapping turtle in my tank but it ran away. The turtle will most likely eat the fish eventually, and what expensive fish food you have.

Tony G.

Hello. I would advise you not to keep him. Not only because he is wild, but because he could be carrying disease. As far as leaving fish with him, i would say no to this also. The fact that he has already rammed your cory, is a sign of agression, and IMO our cory´s an other fish will start dissapearing soon.

As far as feeding, you could try worms, and maybe feeder fish (the ones you raised yourself, as store bought feeders carry disease)

do you know what kind of snapper he is? there are everal kinds
I once ket a common.. but after he got bigger than 1 foot,a dn began trying to bite me he had to go.

Pics would be nice

Also, i would suggest once you remove the turtle, you cycle your tank properly, as it can harm your fish.

i have kept turtles before. I kept a breeding pair of red eare sldiers. They started quarter sized and 6 years later were reachng 10" it is by far an expensive hobby. I had to buy a plastic pond ( the kind you get at home depot at the gardening section) and they barely lived well.

Lucy

How do you know he was heading the wrong way? Maybe he was leaving the stream.
IMO, he should be returned to the exact same place you found him.
I believe they're omnivores so I would take a guess that small fish would be in it's diet.

okami789

woah~ that was fast! well, umm.... the cory doesnt seem to be hurt. i checked it all, over, i think it's fine. i hope. i think it;s just a bit peeved ~ and Ralphie, on the other hand, is scared stiff of all the fish after his encounter with the baby cory. just right now he's in his corner ~ i doubt he will eat them. i've counted the fish, none are missing. are you sure i should let him go? and the reason we kept him was that the "stream" was only a little trickle and there wasn't any water anywhere else. he seems nice, and hasn't bitten anyone/anything so far, but that might just be my biased twelve-year-old mind thinking that every moving creature on earth is a cuddly-wuddly- cutie pie. i'll try and get a few photos of the tanlk

Tony G.

i think it would be best if you let him go where you found him.

iloveengl

I'm sorry, Okami, but I agree with the others 100% - he is a wild animal and he should be returned exactly to the same spot you found him. It may have seemed like a trickle of water, but that's where your snapper likes to live.

There are a number of reasons why he should not be kept in a tank:

1. Wild reptiles are extremely likely to carry diseases that transfer to people (please wash your hands asap after touching the turtle). Even though you can't see it and he doesn't look sick, he can make you and your fish really sick.

2. Snapping turtles (even the smallest of the types) grow too big for a tank because they like to roam. When your turtle is grown, he will be at least 12-18 inches and he will definitely eat your fish then. It will hurt him to grow in a too-small tank.

3. He's cute and cuddly now, but my cousin lost the tip of his pinky finger to a juvenile snapper. Enough said about that.


I understand your good intentions, though. I was exactly like you at 12 - I'm sure most of us were. Everything seems in need of saving. Heehee. If you want the best for the little turtle, he really should be released back to his home where you found him. Some animals are just meant to live in their natural wild homes.

It's wonderful, though, that you have a big heart for so many kinds of animals. Once you are older, you may be able to have your own big tank that will make a nice home for a small type of turtle.

Amanda

I second what everyone else is saying - that turtle needs to be released. I have moved many snappers back to my local river, but I have never even given a thought to keeping a wild animal. Especially one that gets so large & aggressive.
Snappers carry MANY diseases that humans can contract, please release this turtle.

sirdarksol

I think the motion carries. The general opinion is that the turtle should be released.
I'm not so much of the opinion that "it's a wild animal, so it shouldn't be kept" since all of our pets were, at one point, wild animals, but that turtle is going to need a pond within a year or two. It is also going to eat your fish. This isn't a matter of "if," it's a matter of "when." Alligator snappers are excellent ambush predators, and your fish have shown you that they are willing to get within neck's reach of the thing.

It may have been moving away from the stream because there was no food in the stream. Turtles are capable of traveling quite a distance over land to find new homes as is necessary.

okami789

WAAAAAAA!!!!! one of my guppies died ALREADY>>>>>>>>:C

Ralphie hasn't been eatin that much~ but my dad put the dead guppy in his corner and he ignored it, but i came back after a while to check on it and it was gone. my dad either flushed it down the u-know-poo or Ralphie ate it.

i dunno if i can let him go or not, its up to my dad~

btw, before i got home from school the first day we got Ralphie, i had no idea about him.
i actually have no idea, just telling it the way my dad said it. in other words, in the woods, lost.

whisper

Yes. PLEASE,PLEASE,PLEASE take him back where you found him. In nature they can take care of themselves much better then you can. They already know what they want to eat and will find it in the wild. Do that little guy a favore and take him back.

okami789

or get crushed by a car.

Tony G.

he probably wasnt lost.. just trying to find his way home. If he does pass naturally, then it was meant to be...

sirdarksol

Yes, that is a possibility, but we cannot protect every wild animal from every death that could befall it.

My primary point is that a snapping turtle needs much more space than any standard aquarium can provide, so, unless your dad can provide it with a pond, removing it from the wild didn't save the thing. Rather, it guaranteed that it was going to die a very uncomfortable death.
My secondary point is that your fish will eventually become its supper.

It is, of course, your dad's choice, but please let him know what you've been told here. Pull up some info on snapping turtles so you can show him. Let him know that, if it's kept in captivity, it may lose its resistance to wild diseases and the like, or may become overweight, unhealthy, and less likely to survive when (if) it is released. Be polite, of course. We don't want you to get in trouble.
Good luck.

okami789

grrrrrrrrrrrr................. this is kinda hard on me.... i know i SHOULD let him go, but i really don't want to. ugh, the mind of a 12 year old is a stubborn one. i just can't ber with the thought of our tank withought Ralphie in it. it was a short two weeks with him, but still, i'd miss him so much. we put up the tank in the first place FOR him! we actually got the fish with the intention of letting him eat them if he wanted, and letting them live if he didn't. btw, while we have him, WHAT SHOULD WE FEED HIM we gave him a few turtle pellets but dont think he ate many.... maybe not even any at all... for all i know, he might be living on the dead fish we let him eat a yesterday... *sniffs* poor guppy... and it was the pregnant one! i've read that snapping turtles are omnivors. what do we give him? lettuce?


btw, i found a CREEEEAAAATTURE in the tank today. at first glance i thought it was as shrimp - my first thought was "maybe one of the fish ate it and then when it got to our tank threw it upo and it was still alive" - but then i realized that that made no sense whatsoever. ah, the demented 12 year old's brain..... i looked closer, and it was a teeeeeeny tiiiiiny little thing -looked like a baby fish - but i cant be sure. it was brownish-see through with itty-bitty fins and an itty-bitty mouth. it was kinda cute~ but then asgain i think everything's cute. could the pregnant guppy have given birth before it died? maybe it died giving birth.... is it likely that there's more? what do i do about it?

since i don't really know exactly WHAT it is, i'm calling it George (even if it's a girl). if it turns out that there's more, it'll be George#1, George #2, George #3.... and so on. hehe.

Tony G.

its probably a guppy fry. It could have died of stress...

bolivianbaby

We all know you're attached to him. When I was younger, we had a box turtle that came to our house every year in the spring for 3 years straight. We think it was the same one, although now that I'm older, I don't think it really was.

Her name was Michelle. When she came to our house, we just put out lettuce for a few days until she left. We never tried to keep her as a pet, but for 3 years straight a turtle showed up at our house.

Sometimes as we're growing up, we have to make some tough decisions. We have to do what's best for someone else instead of what's best for us. I bet George has a family somewhere that's wondering where he is.

I hope this helps you

iloveengl

I agree with BB who I'm sure meant Raphael Tuttle (not the baby gups) has his own family in the wild who miss him. Without a doubt, Raphael Tuttle will have a better chance of a good life back in the forest than in an aquarium.

But maybe you can take some pictures of him now, so you can always remember him and remember what a brave and grown-up decision you helped your dad make when releasing him back to his home.

MaddieLynn

The baby turtle was most likely trying to find its way to the water from its nest site where it had just hatched.

I also agree that you should let it go.

sirdarksol

It very well could have been. Turtles have long lives and long memories. It may have learned that your place was a convenient source of food after a long winter's rest.

bolivianbaby

Pheww, you made me feel better (seriously-you just made the memory more special ). At least there's a good chance there's only one box turtle named Michelle in that area instead of 3. That could get kinda confusing

deathtroll

for feeding it you could try the aquatic turtle pellets from the pet store that is what I fed mine when it was small until he started to eat fish. now I feed mine fish and table scraps if I could only get it to eat its veggies still use some pellets for that.

things to think about a common snapping turtle has a very long neck and once something gets in their mouth you pretty much have to wait for it to let go. it once took me 45 min to rescue a toy that somehow ended up in with stew (my turtle)

okami789

are snapping turtles omnivors?

btw.... whenever we get the chance, we'll try to release him.....

dunno exactly where he was, so maybe the local pond?

we had a situation similar to this.... my dad found a box turtle ~ and in the nick of time. he almost got ran over -he was in the middle of the road....

we let that one go to the pond, and i'm sure he's fine. maybe still alive?
theres alot of turtles at that pond - they seem to like it there. would that be a good place for him??

o yea, and i found out that Ralphie ate half the dead guppy... but then stopped.

but seriously in the mean time, WE HAVE NO IDEA HOW TO TAKE CARE OF RALPHIE!!!!!
my dad used to be a vet, has worked at the zoo, and has had many aquariums, but we've never kiept a turtle.

sirdarksol

Returning it to where your dad found it is the best thing to do for it, especially if you haven't ever raised turtles. If I ever see a turtle in a dangerous place (like the middle of the road), I figure out which way it's going and put it on the other side of the danger, and never more than 50' or so from where it was, because I don't want to confuse it.
If that pond already has several snapping turtles, adding another one could simply starve one out. Or, if there aren't any, you may be adding a predator that will severely unbalance the pond's ecosystem.

Just my opinion.

If you're set on caring for the thing, they're primarily piscovores. They ambush fish that swim by them, and they're very, very good at it (this is why I say that it's only a matter of time before it eats all of your fish). Bits of fish or shrimp are going to be its primary food (no feeders, unless you raise them yourself on a highly nutritious diet). It does not need a tropical tank (though its range suggests that it would be perfectly happy in one). I live in MN, and I've seen very active snappers in lake water too cold for me to swim in.
It will grow fairly quickly at first, and will need continuous upgrades in tank sizes, until it will just need a pond. By that point, it will be getting to the point where it's dangerous (though not necessarily more than other similar-sized reptiles). Contrary to popular belief, a snapping turtle held by the tail can and will try to get ahold of what's got it. They've got amazingly long necks.

okami789

well, we originally got our fish as feeder fish for him, soooo.....
o yea, he seems to have a taste for tetras ):
2 got eaten... but o well, they were his food anyways
ate half a guppy that died while they were getting used to the tank, then ignored it....apparently tetras taste better...

my dad said he found another baby snapper at that pond, a bunch of them his age were in the pond i talked (more like typed) about... if we released him there, do u thoink he would be ok?

btw my dad gave me the job of researching stuff for him; i have an odd obsession for researching things (my last research project was on house centipedes).... i found this site a few months ago while researching zebrafish, and its been so helpful ~ i love this site! it's still my favorite fish site (for some reason my favorite research topic is fish).
anyways, i found a few snapper care sites that said he can eat goldfish, goby, mice, bananas, spinach, cabbage, salmon, chicken, shrimp, feeder fish, crickets, liver, crayfish, and a whole bunch of other stuff. does he really eat that many different foods? it said we have to walk him on sunny days and feed him vitamins. is all this true?

Tony G.

ummm no... not all of it. I eould advise against feeding him the mice. You dont need to walk him, nor give him vitamins, they get that through their food, though sometimes it is necessary to supplement with calcium for their shells. I would go with what sirdarksol said...

deathtroll

if you are going to release it the sooner the better imo.
if you care for him the best way to hold them when they get bigger is by the shell right in front of the back legs. and that can take some work they have very powerful legs and their claws can be very sharp.
for food they should be mostly fish with some vegetable matter mixed in

care should always be taken when handling it or cleaning it's tank they are alot quicker than they look

sirdarksol

Deathtroll's advice is good: If you're going to release it, do it soon. Captivity reduces its immunity and the skills it needs to survive in the wild.

Mice wouldn't necessarily be bad, but there would be better choices. Chicken or other fowl would actually be good (the chicks of various waterfowl are a favorite of snappers). NO FEEDERS/GOLDFISH/ETC... unless you plan on raising them yourself and feeding them a high-vitamin diet. Store-bought feeder fish are full of disease and have almost no nutritional value. Ignore the information from any site that suggested feeders. They may have some stuff right, but it would be really hard to pick out the good from the bad in such a site.
As was said, lots of fish, a few veggies (and some fowl periodically).
I'm going to disagree with Tony on the vitamins. Because we usually don't perfectly replicate our pets' diets, it's usually a good idea to add vitamins/minerals. There are powders that are made to be added to reptiles' food. One of these would be good.

Tony G.

I agree. I meant supplement as in powdered calcium. When i used to keep turtles i would powder their pellets before i fed them. I used a repti---- i dont remember what the calcium was called. It is the kind you sprinkle on top of the food (I.e. lettuce tomatoes, that kind of stuff) I used the Reptomin pellet brand... i also added calcium to their food once a week, not everyday haha

sirdarksol

Yeah, calcium in particular is necessary because we don't often feed our pets the bones (which most of our pets would willingly eat).