New aquarium setup!
Hey there! I just wanted to post about my slightly revamped turtle environment.
Here's what it looked like before:
I had it with very shallow water, because when I initially tried it with deeper water I was afraid my babies would drown! They weren't very good swimmers and they couldn't pull themselves onto the basking platform I had originally gotten. I had to get them this one with the cute little stairs.
However, they got bigger, and I wanted to make the water a bit deeper but I couldn't because then I'd be covering up their basking rock with water. The other thing is as they got bigger, they could no longer swim around their nice basking rock with the stairs, because there wasn't enough space between the corner column on the platform and the aquarium wall for Gary's much-bigger shell. So, I've had them for almost a year and I decided that I'd change things up a bit.
1) They are finicky little children and won't eat their veggies. I figured maybe that had something to do with the fact that the decorative plants in there were plastic. Maybe they tried to eat a plant, realized it was inedible, and stayed away from green ever since. So I bought them a live plant for the tank, thinking maybe if it's always available, they'll give it another go. The plant I got (anacharis) is supposed to be good food for turtles and fish.
2) Speaking of fish, I had originally gotten 20 feeder guppies for them as live food, thinking they'd eat a bunch, and then maybe they'd reproduce and I'd have a nice supply of self-replenishing live food. Unfortunately, I don't think the turtles ate ANY of the fish, and now I have an army of ugly nondescript guppies that are nothing more than a pain in the butt when I need to clean the tank. Well, they are a little interesting to watch swim around. But I figured if the fish are going to be permanent residents of the tank (I still want to keep them in there for interest and just in case the turtles decide to try to catch them), they may as well be pretty. So I got five "fancy" guppies to add to the collection. Significantly more expensive ($3 each instead of 10 for a dollar), but they do add a lot and the turtles were intrigued by them. Two are speckled, one is black with an orange tail, and two are white with orange and yellow tails.
3) I put about 12 gallons of water in instead of 6 this time. I brought back the old, original floating basking platform (which also frees up the space underneath for swimming), and a completely submerged cave/platform. That way they still have a place to hide, but they can also use the platform as a stepping stone up to the basking rock, and they have much more vertical space to swim in (as opposed to simply walking under water)
You can see the basic layout here. Much deeper water for swimming, bigger basking area, more swimming area, and a little potted plant in each corner (kept in place with nice decorative clear stones). You can see one of them on the little cave area. You can also see two or three of the fancy guppies to his left.
Both of my turtles managed to get up on the basking platform with no problems this time! They have been up there quite a bit, just today! I put food up there to entice them at first but now they have gotten the hang of it with no additional incentive.
Here they are over by one of the plants.
They can use the plants to sort of prop themselves up to reach the air.
Look! He's actually SWIMMING! I didn't know this was possible!
Here's what it looked like before:
I had it with very shallow water, because when I initially tried it with deeper water I was afraid my babies would drown! They weren't very good swimmers and they couldn't pull themselves onto the basking platform I had originally gotten. I had to get them this one with the cute little stairs.
However, they got bigger, and I wanted to make the water a bit deeper but I couldn't because then I'd be covering up their basking rock with water. The other thing is as they got bigger, they could no longer swim around their nice basking rock with the stairs, because there wasn't enough space between the corner column on the platform and the aquarium wall for Gary's much-bigger shell. So, I've had them for almost a year and I decided that I'd change things up a bit.
1) They are finicky little children and won't eat their veggies. I figured maybe that had something to do with the fact that the decorative plants in there were plastic. Maybe they tried to eat a plant, realized it was inedible, and stayed away from green ever since. So I bought them a live plant for the tank, thinking maybe if it's always available, they'll give it another go. The plant I got (anacharis) is supposed to be good food for turtles and fish.
2) Speaking of fish, I had originally gotten 20 feeder guppies for them as live food, thinking they'd eat a bunch, and then maybe they'd reproduce and I'd have a nice supply of self-replenishing live food. Unfortunately, I don't think the turtles ate ANY of the fish, and now I have an army of ugly nondescript guppies that are nothing more than a pain in the butt when I need to clean the tank. Well, they are a little interesting to watch swim around. But I figured if the fish are going to be permanent residents of the tank (I still want to keep them in there for interest and just in case the turtles decide to try to catch them), they may as well be pretty. So I got five "fancy" guppies to add to the collection. Significantly more expensive ($3 each instead of 10 for a dollar), but they do add a lot and the turtles were intrigued by them. Two are speckled, one is black with an orange tail, and two are white with orange and yellow tails.
3) I put about 12 gallons of water in instead of 6 this time. I brought back the old, original floating basking platform (which also frees up the space underneath for swimming), and a completely submerged cave/platform. That way they still have a place to hide, but they can also use the platform as a stepping stone up to the basking rock, and they have much more vertical space to swim in (as opposed to simply walking under water)
You can see the basic layout here. Much deeper water for swimming, bigger basking area, more swimming area, and a little potted plant in each corner (kept in place with nice decorative clear stones). You can see one of them on the little cave area. You can also see two or three of the fancy guppies to his left.
Both of my turtles managed to get up on the basking platform with no problems this time! They have been up there quite a bit, just today! I put food up there to entice them at first but now they have gotten the hang of it with no additional incentive.
Here they are over by one of the plants.
They can use the plants to sort of prop themselves up to reach the air.
Look! He's actually SWIMMING! I didn't know this was possible!