Urgent Care :: in need of some help......quicklike

[ndchickadee]

Hey!!!
so i got my turtles in the streets of NY, sounds horrible i know, but i feel in love, n this man on the street told me that they were gonna be in oriental stew if i didnt,,,, welll.... my little guys.. or girls.. are over 6 months, and still soooooo tiny. Im from ND and no one seems to know anything about turtles around here, i bought the 10 gallon tank, no heater yet, the dock, the rocks, the filter, the unground blah blah blah... all ofit. they HATE pellets, they refuse to eat them, they love crickets, they arnet eating any vegetables as of yet either. My water gets DISGUSTING after 2 hrs let alone, be cute enough to take pics of them in the filth.. uggh
i got them guppies too, they love me, fish are their friends, ha
its bazaar

but as for mertyle hes really sick i think, hes peeling, he barely ever swims anymore, hes constantly on the dock, and always has his left eye closed. My other guy Ruepert *ruey* seems to be doing alot better, growing, harder shell, and not peeling at all.

what the heck do i do...
ahhhhhhh im sooo scared hes not gonna make it!!

better water quality...
harder turtles...
any more food options?
i have a heat lamp, and the UVB but nothing really seems to be working..
etc.. please please help!! email me bsbgirl_186@yahoo.com

[sonyj]

Two turtles in a ten gallon tank is more than likely what's causing the poor water quality. Recommended tank size is ten gallons per inch of turtle. Ten gallons in bare minimum for one 1inch hatchling. Anything larger and then you need a much larger habitat. The filter should be rated for a tank 2-3x's it's size since filters are rated for fish not turtles which are much messier. The less water the turtles have and a poor filter is going to cause the water quality to degrade fast.

Habitat and diet is everything to the health of a turtle. Getting a tank, a heater, filter, basking area, UVB light and heat light, correct water temps, correct basking temps, and correct healthy diet will go a long way in helping your turtles get and remain healthy. They need to have a reputable pellet as the staple of their diet every other day and veggies daily. You are the only one that can do this and sometimes it takes a little tough love to see that it happens. With holding what they like to eat for a few days and only offering what they should eat usually works well.

Read through the forum and mainsite to see what the basic care requirements are. There's two lists of what to feed and what not to feed under the feeding and nutrition section of the forum, check them out.

Do you have any pics that you can post? It might help to see the peeling shell that you are talking about? Turtles shells shed naturally as does their skin. Is this what is happening or is it something abnormal?

[marisa]

The skin or the shell is peeling?

What are the basking area and water temps? (Do you have a submersible heater for them?) Do you have a filter? If not, how often do you change the water?

What pellets are you trying to feed them? Try to get the scent of something smelly on them (like the water from tuna or sardines) and see if that doesn't help. Mertyle is still eating something? You said the eye was closed--is it swollen (or are both eyes swollen)?

[ndchickadee]

http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/bsbgirl_186/my_photos


OR

http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/bsbgirl_1 ... /my_photos

Im hoping one of them works

[ellman605]

that looks like shell rot to me...

[marisa]

I see the areas on the shell, but the pics are blurry. Are the areas soft at all? Is there any odor coming from them? Or, is the shell hard and the areas just look like they're going to peel? If it's the former, it's most likely shell rot...

There's some good info on shell problems, including shell rot here: http://www.austinsturtlepage.com/Care/medshell.htm