Other Turtle Discussion :: turtle/reptile rescuers - share your stories

[theartbook35]

Have you legitimately rescued a turtle? I don't mean when people take them out of a pond cause they thought it'd be better off in captivity. I mean, finding turtles near or in roads and getting them to safety, adopting, stuff like that.

My closest thing to a rescue was taking Sadie home. My mother's friend knows a bunch of people who own turtles and one guy had been keeping Sadie in a modified 40 gallon breeder. This tank was horrible, the filter was in terrible condition and there was no adequate basking area. I have no idea why she didn't get shell rot. Because he had fed her nothing but live food most of her life, we have to give her nothing but megaworms and krill/shrimp and it was a battle to get her to eat pellets. Sadie is well socialized, she'll let me pet her in the water but doesn't like to be held by anyone other than my mother. And Sadie doesn't like children at all. She likes our cat, Spike, though. She pretty much is the way she is, and there is little wiggle room. I think she is very happy, however. Her loves wandering around the house once a week, and in warm weather we take her outside. She gets very excited when she can run around in the grass

[Turtle Mummy 101]

I like to think I rescued Charlotte. At the pet store where I got her she was in a 5gal tank with 30-40 turtles of different species. There was no basking platform or even enough water to cover all of their shells. They were basically all just swimming over her. The lady told me Charlotte was "old stock" and they were going to be "getting rid of her soon" because she had yet to sell. She even offered her to me at a discounted price. I also noticed she seemed sick and her tail had been scarred. I decided to try and help her out - who knows what would have happened to her if I didn't. Although there were many obstacles at first everything seemed to work out in the end. Now she's a year old and couln't be better. I'm definitely glad I took a chance on her

[worldpeace]

I rescued Charlotte from a lady who was disabled and found it difficult to take care of a turtle. She bought the turtle because it was so small and cute and didn't seem like that much work. That was true when the turtle was younger but when it grew and was moved into a bigger tank, the lady just couldn't deal with all the water changes because of her condition. So she tried to sell it for about a year and no one wanted her. When I saw the ad, she was on the verge of releasing the turtle into the wild because she just couldn't keep it anymore (by the way, I'm in Canada and the turtle would've probably died once winter came). At the time of the rescue, Charlotte's tank hasn't been cleaned in about a year, the tank's glass was entirely green-brown and you couldn't see through it, and Charlotte's shell had a severe case of pyramiding and was completely black (covered in grime and algae). Once at my house, I cleaned everything, including Charlotte. In the coming months, with a proper diet, basking, and clean water, she started to shed her scutes and only now, 9 months later, does her shell look smooth and healthy.

At the time of the rescue I had another male turtle and was hoping that I could house the two of them together. Unfortunately that didn't work out so now I have two 50 something gallon tanks in my bedroom. Nonetheless, I'm really happy I decided to take Charlotte into my home.