Hi guys,
So, I didn't post about it, but last year, a big female red eared slider I had adopted from a friend of my mother's perished in the outdoor pond over the winter. One day in December, it was warm out, and she emerged from the mud to bask. A cold front came in later that evening, and the pond froze over by the next day. Well, I guess froze over is an exaggeration, but some sheets of ice formed in the water, floated about, then melted over the following afternoon. Regardless, the girl must not have gone deep enough, or perhaps she drown during the temperature plunge, because I found her dead and floating the following weekend.
Now, I don't have animals die on me very often. But when it does unfortunately happen, my first instinct is to seize control of the variable that allowed it to happen and ensure that it never happens again. So, the more I've thought about this, the more I've come to the conclusion that I should brumate my turtles the way I brumate my tortoises, indoors in a commercial refrigerator. Now, what I'm looking for is some pointers, seeing as how I've never done it before. I have some ideas, and I'm just going to bounce them off ya'll, see what you think.
My plan, as of now, is to get some sturdy food service tubs, the kind fast food restaurants use for keeping big bins of salad. I will then fill this will a mixture of mud and leaf litter to ensure an adequate level of moisture. I will engage in business as usual until November, when I will stop feeding the animals. I will leave them without food for a month while they draw down. At the end of November, I'll get dirty, collect the turtles, then transport them to their respective containers. I'll do this on a cold December morning to ensure they stay asleep.
Now, my main concern is, will they become dehydrated in a mud/leaf litter hibernaculum? Will they suffer a respiratory infection? Should I use sphagnum moss and mud instead? I didn't want to just use water or water and mud or water and leaf litter, because a small bin doesn't have the dissolved oxygen content of the pond, so I would be concerned about a brumating turtle in a small tub suffocating due to a lack of dissolved oxygen. I had considered using air stones, but I was concerned that this would cause too much disturbance, too much movement of the water. Am I wrong in thinking this way? I've heard of folks who have brumated wood turtles using the fridge method using water and no leaf litter? Would the mechanism be the same for a northern red belly?
Anywho, has anyone else tried brumating turtles in a fridge? I've done it successfully with tortoises for decades. I figure it's just a question of getting the media within the hibernaculum right. Ultimately, I'm just furious that that big red ear died before it was her time. She was fourteen years old and huge, had plenty of years left. She didn't deserve to go out like that. I would like to ensure that none of my northern red bellies go out like this. South Texas winters are a roller coaster, and I'm no longer interested in putting my animals at risk.
T.G.
So, I didn't post about it, but last year, a big female red eared slider I had adopted from a friend of my mother's perished in the outdoor pond over the winter. One day in December, it was warm out, and she emerged from the mud to bask. A cold front came in later that evening, and the pond froze over by the next day. Well, I guess froze over is an exaggeration, but some sheets of ice formed in the water, floated about, then melted over the following afternoon. Regardless, the girl must not have gone deep enough, or perhaps she drown during the temperature plunge, because I found her dead and floating the following weekend.
Now, I don't have animals die on me very often. But when it does unfortunately happen, my first instinct is to seize control of the variable that allowed it to happen and ensure that it never happens again. So, the more I've thought about this, the more I've come to the conclusion that I should brumate my turtles the way I brumate my tortoises, indoors in a commercial refrigerator. Now, what I'm looking for is some pointers, seeing as how I've never done it before. I have some ideas, and I'm just going to bounce them off ya'll, see what you think.
My plan, as of now, is to get some sturdy food service tubs, the kind fast food restaurants use for keeping big bins of salad. I will then fill this will a mixture of mud and leaf litter to ensure an adequate level of moisture. I will engage in business as usual until November, when I will stop feeding the animals. I will leave them without food for a month while they draw down. At the end of November, I'll get dirty, collect the turtles, then transport them to their respective containers. I'll do this on a cold December morning to ensure they stay asleep.
Now, my main concern is, will they become dehydrated in a mud/leaf litter hibernaculum? Will they suffer a respiratory infection? Should I use sphagnum moss and mud instead? I didn't want to just use water or water and mud or water and leaf litter, because a small bin doesn't have the dissolved oxygen content of the pond, so I would be concerned about a brumating turtle in a small tub suffocating due to a lack of dissolved oxygen. I had considered using air stones, but I was concerned that this would cause too much disturbance, too much movement of the water. Am I wrong in thinking this way? I've heard of folks who have brumated wood turtles using the fridge method using water and no leaf litter? Would the mechanism be the same for a northern red belly?
Anywho, has anyone else tried brumating turtles in a fridge? I've done it successfully with tortoises for decades. I figure it's just a question of getting the media within the hibernaculum right. Ultimately, I'm just furious that that big red ear died before it was her time. She was fourteen years old and huge, had plenty of years left. She didn't deserve to go out like that. I would like to ensure that none of my northern red bellies go out like this. South Texas winters are a roller coaster, and I'm no longer interested in putting my animals at risk.
T.G.
