General Care Discussion :: Turtle Soup!!!!!

[puiyanpuiyan]

This is extremely upsetting to me. I am a RES lover, and today when I went to my usual Chinese supermarket to buy some fruits, I heard one child kept saying "turtle turtle".
So I looked at where the child was pointing......OMG, they were selling RES with the other fresh seafood!
I rushed over and asked them what are these turtles doing here, and the staff replied "they make yummy turtle soup"!
So of course I dropped everything and brought all 3 home, they are huge females, more than 20 years old (I already have two 18 year olds at home)....all of them have clear eyes: one super healthy looking with a beautiful shell. Another one has a bunch of white dots on the shell, the remaining one has wound on her head and both hands...which when I came home I washed and fed them (they are still scared and wouldn't eat), and applied healing ointment on the wounded one.
Now I want to know if any of you experienced something like this! And any idea where I can report this? I know turtle babies are illegal to be sold, what about these adults being sold as food? That's so aweful! I wonder how they ended up there in the first place, unwanted pets or caught in the pond?
oh yeah, and they were $8 each, $8 for a turtle that has lived more than 20 years!!!! This is such a shame, I feel embarrassed being chinese myself!

[steve]

I avoid the seafood section because of this and the frogs. I would more often see soft shell turtles than RES but it's heartbreaking to know it happens. I do not think it is illegal unless they are kept in unsanitary conditions.

[devilduck]

Old Chinese proverb, "The Chinese eat everything that has four legs, except tables; everything that flies, except for airplanes; and everything that is found on water, except boats." Is true to a degree. I remember my parents bringing home RES to make turtle soup and seeing dog meat sold in markets in mainland China.

[smartygurl]

Hi new to the board. I had a similar situation here, and that is how I got my two RES. One is male and the other female. They are 7 inches in length so I am guessing they are around age 2-3 years. They were very scared and shy at first, but the male is coming around more and is more interactive and doesn't hide as much. I am feeding them pellets and trying to get them onto eating red leaf lettuce. I have some Water Lettuce plants I give them from my pond, and they eat the roots off. LOL I guess that's a start. Anyway, I don't think it's illegal to sell them for food as many cultures do eat them unfortunately.

[MVB]

This is odd to me. I'm white, but I'm a veteran Chinese Restaurant kitchen boy and my wife is Chinese. I've always heard that Sliders were no good for turtle soup because they're all shell and very little meat, with soft-shell turtles being the preferred ingredient.

Personally, I don't like to think about eating turtles. My pet turtles are my babies and even though I've only had them a few weeks I've grown very attached to them. I've always loved turtles and tortoises... but I also don't like to 'yuck' peoples 'yums', or judge, or discriminate against people with different tastes or cultural preferences to my own.

My grandmother (in law) is a sweet old lady from China and when I last saw her, my wife asked her if she'd ever eaten dog. Yes, she had, even though that's not as common as people in the west seem to think - and she thought it was delicious. I've kept dogs as pets through most of my life, so I'd probably never eat one, but I have eaten cow, pig, chicken and numerous other animals, almost all of which would make beautiful, gentle pets under the right circumstances.

I try not to judge people. These sorts of ethical quandaries are why I switched to a vegetarian diet around a year ago. I personally love animals and don't feel right about contributing to their suffering.

[MVB]

Incidentally (and on a bit of a tangent), I'm reminded of the sad tale of the Galapagos Island Giant Tortoises and how they now verge on extinction. When man first set foot on the Galapagos Islands, those Tortoises weren't afraid of us, because they had no natural predators. They would walk right up to the sailors who were invading their space and the sailors responded by killing and eating them. Those tortoises had the most delicious meat any of those sailors had ever tasted (described as tasting like beef drenched in butter), so the sailors kept eating them. They were meant to bring living specimens home for study, but the literally could not resist eating them on the journey home every time they tried to ship one (not to mention that their bladder kept pristine drinking water, which is a rarity at sea). Even Charles Darwin partook. As a result the Tortoises were never given their Latin names and with the death of Lonesome George last year (the pinta variety), some species of Galapagos Tortoise are entirely extinct.

Luckily, the chances of history repeating itself with our little turtles is highly unlikely, because they are in no way engendered. In face, if RES are being bred for food, it probably improves their chances of long-term survival as a species.

[johnrisky]

Yeah, true, that kinda soft shell turtle is one of the ingredients in Chinese medicine, most people who would eat turtles is mainly because of that.

[apondfortimmy]

I would have bought those turtles too.
Yikes.

I ... yeah. Sigh.