Habitat - Indoor :: Grapevine

[KatieSmeltzer]

Ugh. So I accidentally bought grapevine instead of driftwood. I figured I'd try it out in my tank anyway. So after TWO WEEKS of leaching it in a bucket of water I added it to the tank today. Yeah, it lasted about 20 minutes. First, Filbert was afraid of it (*ha*). Then he figured that he could climb on it (*yay*). And then he figured that he could bite at it (*boo*). I let him go at it for a few minutes, but then I realized that he was actually splintering it and getting chunks off. It definitely came out right after that!

[steve]

Would driftwood splinter too? I haven't used any before. My male RES is always biting his cork bark, slowly making it smaller. He pretty much destroyed half of his previous one.

[KatieSmeltzer]

I don't know if driftwood would splinter. But I just didn't think that the grapevine splinters would be good on Filbert's digestive system.

[SINI5T3R]

Im sure if u get a nice solid piece of drift wood it would be nice and not splinter. I think it all depends on the size of the turtle to tell the truth. Them big ones can bite chunks out of almost anything lol.

[marisa]

Grapevine isn't meant to be in a wet environment/submerged in water. I once tried some, and while my hatchings (at the time) didn't bite it, it would develop a slimy whitish-green coating that would frequently have to be cleaned, only to quickly reappear.

If you plan to use drift wood, try Malaysian (it's heavy and hard to bite). There's also Mopani. another dense wood. Either one can be submersed in water. My favorite material, however, is corkbark.

[KatieSmeltzer]

The reason that I wanted driftwood was to promote some algae growth, for my plecco. Now the grapevine is a "decorative" piece on my window sill. o_O What a waste of money.