Feeding and Nutrition :: Fish Flakes as a staple diet?

[i.love.res]

Hi guys,
I'm new here.About a week ago i bought a res from my local lfs .The turt came with a blue plastic tank with a coconut tree, at first i thought it was ok, but after reading this site, i realised tat turts need a tank and uv lighting a stuff, and so i went out and got everything needed. However, a new problerm came out, turns out the shop keeper use to feed the turts with tropical fish flakes, and so i think my turt is used to it, as it ate a ton of fish food mean for the guppies in the tank, and it refuses reptomin pellets.He only attempted to eat reptomin once, but spat it out and nvr tried again I tried searching the fourm for similar cases but found none....
Can fish food be a staple diet to it??? the protein content is pretty high, so i am afraid it may lead to health issues.
Btw, he also seems scared whenever i turn the basking light on or off,he kinda darts around the tank whenever i turn it on, and does the same when i turn it off.
His tanks temp is about 75 degrees farenheit, and he has a full spectrum basking light, but he nvr uses it, currently hes been survivng on fish flakes alone for about 4 days now

[steve]

You'll eventually want to migrate to a good turtle pellet. If the turtle has a good appetite and has been eating, stop using the flakes and only use the pellets for a few days. He'll get the idea.

Can you post a pic of you basking area?

[vear]

You should let him get used to it. Keep in mind that he's probably still settling in. When you first bring them home RES tend to be very skittish. Keep offering the pellets, fish food should not be their staple diet.

[i.love.res]

Hey guys thanks for the advice, i tried giving him reptomin today, but he didn't eat it as usual,however i went to get the fish net to scope the pellets out, i was suprised, the pellets were gone.Does this mean hes eating? or could the feeder guppies have eaten the pellet instead.Anyway i feed him one pellet 3 times daily, is that ok? As i read that they need to be fed food quantity that is no bigger than the size of his head, and hes a hatchling, so his heads pretty small
Btw any suggestions on cool turtle names, my babys still a nameless fella

[vear]

Hey,if the pellets are too big for your little one, you can break them in half.

[steve]

Pellets will come apart in water and the guppies would eat it too. Is he still eating the fish flakes?

[i.love.res]

@steve Nope its been two days of strict pellet food(reptomin baby), but he still shows no interest in them
I'm kind of scared he'll starve to death, since he refuses pellets.
I don't think the pellet came apart, as i only left them in water for a few min
@vear The pellets i use are reptomin baby, are this too big? I don't really know since he does not try to eat them.Though they are about the size of his head
Sometimes i think he dosen't know that pellets are food, he only looks at them and swim away.
Should i try jello shots?

[steve]

I'm not sure what you mean be "they are about the size of his head", Reptomin Baby is fairly small. You can certainly try the jell-o shots... but I would give it another day.

[i.love.res]

@steve I mean the pellets are about the size of my turts head, oh yea, i think he has got a little problem with pellets becos they're hard, today he bit one, but looked like he had difficulty chewing it, in the end he spit it out,and once again stopped having interest in them.i don't really know why, but he started biting his reflection in the glass
Anyway do you guys recommend starving it? I read in some other post that they starve their turtle to get them to eat veggies, will it work in pellets?

[steve]

Withholding other food is only recommended for turtles who are healthy... you're not sure how much your turtle has eaten before, correct?

[i.love.res]

Erm well, i've seen him eat a lot and i mean ALOT of fish food, and some dried shrimp(wich he really liked, which is also the thing that enticed him to eat), but nvr pellets, not even one
Update, today he got kind of interested in pellets, he continuosly bit the repotomin pellet, but i didn't soften this one, as i thought he would refuse it again, so he bit it while it was hard, and i think he lost interest becos he found it hard to chew, unike fish flakes that instanly become soft in water, pellets take a while, so i usually soften them in water first, is that ok?
Will it cause the pellets to lost it nurtional values?
Btw i think hes really hungry,as i saw him biting his own arm,his reflection and a fake plant decor in his tank. Is that normal?
Is he starving, he hasn't eaten in days, and his some of his scutes seem to have a greyish outline aroud them, is he sick?
Oh yeah one more thing, my neighbour told me that turtles that know how to eat pellets teach the others that they are food, is it true?
Well he suggested putting his 5 month old res together with mine during feeding time.I was just wondering, will this work?
My neighbour also told that was how his turtle learned to eat pellets
Well i don't know if it true, but if it is, i think i'll give it a try, rather than risk my turt straving to death
Anyway, i used to have a really old turtle, it was about 30 years old, i know it does not seem real, but its true, it belonged to my mom, but it kind of passed on last year, so anyway this turtle used to love HBH turtle bites, and so my mom asked if a change of pellets to HBH would help?

[1tdawg]

About the other turt teaching your turt to eat. I dont think it would "teach" your turt to eat but if he watches the other turt eat he might get the idea. My only concern is they might fight if there is too little food or if there is a "territorial" problem (although you could put them in a seperate container but that might make your turtle not want to eat at all). In that case it would be best to keep them apart.

[steve]

I would not introduce the other turtle to yours. Try to mix everything up and try to put him in a container with some water from the tank and offer it to him. This will keep the fish away and limit the mess in your main tank. Do not leave him unsupervised, RES might have difficultly if they flip over in a container with low water levels.

[VeipaCray]

For the pole... the pellets that my turtle likes are not listed. Moe likes the Hikari turtle sticks.

Also for small pellets, zoo med makes hatchling pellets. They are 1/16" per the bottle.

[i.love.res]

@veipaCray, sorry about the poll, this are the only types of food i know a the moment
@Steve, yesterday neighbour lent me some of his turtle food, erm i'm can't really remember the brand, but i think it was nutrafin basic or something, anyway my little turt ate a pellets for the very first time I'm so happy!!!
But then again, i when to check the nutritional values, and found out they don't really have much, but my turtle loves them, should i stick with reptomin, or just continue giving nutrafin basic?
@1tdawg, I decided not to put them together, as the turt is like twice the size of mine, anyway he started eating nutrafin one his own, without watching any other turtle
Oh yeah btw guys how do i put a picture into the post? I want to ask you guy something about my turtles sheel, but its kind of hard to explain using words