Good day from NE Texas!

Puckeroni

New Member
Joined
Nov 21, 2019
Messages
2
Location (City and/or State)
Texas
Good morning!

I am 26 years old and a full-time college student (I want to teach High School History and Govt), writer/artist and pet-mom. I have two cats (Panda and Percy), two dogs (Boogie and Sailor), a lovebird (Ellie) and three turtles/torts.

Im still new to keeping little (and not so little) shell-raisers and somehow acquired three since March of this year. I have a YBS, an Eastern Box and a baby Leo.

To be perfectly honest I took in more than I was ready for and have had to make some huge adjustments to properly care for them as I learned, and let me tell you, its been an experience for me as a person and for my wallet, but I wanted to say that this forum has been instrumental in helping me. When I first adopted any of these babies, I did that thing you're not supposed to do and ran a google search on caresheets and went by the first one I found. We learn from our mistakes. Now that I realized those were lacking, I've been digging deep into any and all information I can find and learned a lot of critical do's and don't's, that you don't find in a basic google search, by feeding through threads, discussions and DIY's posted on here for all three species I keep, all written from experienced keepers from all over.

Experience and guidance aside, this community seems really tight knit and dedicated to exchanging knowledge and making sure everyone can do the best they can with what they have, and after being apart of some -shudders- facebook groups (said experiences being why I didn't immediately join) , I am so excited to be apart of this community and to continue learning.

I will introduce my little ones with pictures of them and their updated setups soon. For now I can tell you their names and a little bit about them.

My Slider is named Pucker (its an inside joke between my best friend and I, who was with me when I got her). She is the first one I got, via my mother who saw some chump selling them in tiny critter keepers in mass on the side of the road when Puck was the size of a silver dollar, and decided to surprise me with one for my birthday. She didn't know at the time that Pucker had the potential to get a foot in size, depending on gender, and had no idea what kind of care and space she needed. I had a small idea because I've always been interested in reptiles, though I was more interested in snakes. Pucker fits in the palm of my hand and is full of more personality than any of us were prepared for. She is about 2.5 inches and I will be upgrading her to a 40 gallon set up by Christmas. She's got some retained scutes from the way I started feeding her before, roughly around may and three months after I had her, I did some research and altered her diet to add in healthy greens and not nearly as many bugs and shrimp.

My box turtle is named Venus. She was an adult we picked up at repticon in Grapevine back in early August, which is also where we got Leo. It wasn't until after I got her home that i realized she was most likely a wildcaught and the lady selling her could not give me any background. There was old damage to the scutes on her carapace like a dog had gotten her at one point. She is pushing 5 inches long. I love seeing her completely buried in her substrate with just her head sticking out to watch for any surprises. She is in an indoor enclosure since we don't have fences where I live (temporarily) and have lots of big (anatolian sheoherd, austrialian shepherd plus others) free ranging dogs. She seems to be doing well and regularly bulldozes her way through everything, toppling anything in her path, and will come out and stare out of the clear side of her set up at me when shes hungry like a demanding, grumpy old bulldog.

Baby Leo was also picked up at repticon from a different vendor. He was the smallest leo tort I'd seen there and the last in the box. I was given a discount on him. He has had the hardest time, due to my ignorance. I was originally keeping him in an open sweater box and he declined over the last several months. I had read somewhere that baby torts slept throughout the day so chalked it off to normal behavior. But he stopped eating regularly (3 weeks ago) and I started to pay closer attention, and at this point started to consume any information I could find on the species. I now know that he was in a completely wrong enclosure. I got him in to see an exotics vet (1 week ago. Could not get him in any sooner) and he was diagnosed with a RI and I was given some instructions on updating his care, but the real gold mine was when I found the caresheets on here. Hes now in a much larger closed chamber and I've been monitoring humidity, ambient and basking temps to meet the given specifications. I've also started taking him out to sun on warmer, sunny days for an hour or two at a time (while I'm there to guard him) for full spectrum sunlight, which he seems to enjoy. He's still undergoing treatment and recovery and I'm still researching...but I will post more about him in detail here soon, with pictures, in the right forum/thread/section. We named him Leo because my older brother insisted on naming him after a ninja turtle. Which isn't too original but it's fitting. I think of him like a little lion sometimes. He's pretty tough for something so puny.

Though I've kind of struggled with keeping turtles and torts, I really enjoy them and I'm trying to do better by them. They've also, especially with Venus being wild caught, have got me looking into conservation and volunteering (I did an essay recently and, if I remember correctly, of the 356 species there's roughly 61% that are endangered due to habitat loss, climate change and poaching for food, medicinal and illegal wildlife trafficking).

Now that I've written you all a small novel to read, I'll give your eyes a rest and post this thing. I am really looking forward to getting to know everyone and learning from everyone's experiences.

Thanks for having me!
 

EllieMay

Well-Known Member
5 Year Member
Joined
Jun 23, 2018
Messages
9,603
Location (City and/or State)
East Texas
Hello & Welcome!!! Looking forward to seeing all your shelled children . We are here to help if you need :)
 

Turtle girl 98

Well-Known Member
Joined
Aug 16, 2019
Messages
768
Location (City and/or State)
Sandstone mn
Good morning!

I am 26 years old and a full-time college student (I want to teach High School History and Govt), writer/artist and pet-mom. I have two cats (Panda and Percy), two dogs (Boogie and Sailor), a lovebird (Ellie) and three turtles/torts.

Im still new to keeping little (and not so little) shell-raisers and somehow acquired three since March of this year. I have a YBS, an Eastern Box and a baby Leo.

To be perfectly honest I took in more than I was ready for and have had to make some huge adjustments to properly care for them as I learned, and let me tell you, its been an experience for me as a person and for my wallet, but I wanted to say that this forum has been instrumental in helping me. When I first adopted any of these babies, I did that thing you're not supposed to do and ran a google search on caresheets and went by the first one I found. We learn from our mistakes. Now that I realized those were lacking, I've been digging deep into any and all information I can find and learned a lot of critical do's and don't's, that you don't find in a basic google search, by feeding through threads, discussions and DIY's posted on here for all three species I keep, all written from experienced keepers from all over.

Experience and guidance aside, this community seems really tight knit and dedicated to exchanging knowledge and making sure everyone can do the best they can with what they have, and after being apart of some -shudders- facebook groups (said experiences being why I didn't immediately join) , I am so excited to be apart of this community and to continue learning.

I will introduce my little ones with pictures of them and their updated setups soon. For now I can tell you their names and a little bit about them.

My Slider is named Pucker (its an inside joke between my best friend and I, who was with me when I got her). She is the first one I got, via my mother who saw some chump selling them in tiny critter keepers in mass on the side of the road when Puck was the size of a silver dollar, and decided to surprise me with one for my birthday. She didn't know at the time that Pucker had the potential to get a foot in size, depending on gender, and had no idea what kind of care and space she needed. I had a small idea because I've always been interested in reptiles, though I was more interested in snakes. Pucker fits in the palm of my hand and is full of more personality than any of us were prepared for. She is about 2.5 inches and I will be upgrading her to a 40 gallon set up by Christmas. She's got some retained scutes from the way I started feeding her before, roughly around may and three months after I had her, I did some research and altered her diet to add in healthy greens and not nearly as many bugs and shrimp.

My box turtle is named Venus. She was an adult we picked up at repticon in Grapevine back in early August, which is also where we got Leo. It wasn't until after I got her home that i realized she was most likely a wildcaught and the lady selling her could not give me any background. There was old damage to the scutes on her carapace like a dog had gotten her at one point. She is pushing 5 inches long. I love seeing her completely buried in her substrate with just her head sticking out to watch for any surprises. She is in an indoor enclosure since we don't have fences where I live (temporarily) and have lots of big (anatolian sheoherd, austrialian shepherd plus others) free ranging dogs. She seems to be doing well and regularly bulldozes her way through everything, toppling anything in her path, and will come out and stare out of the clear side of her set up at me when shes hungry like a demanding, grumpy old bulldog.

Baby Leo was also picked up at repticon from a different vendor. He was the smallest leo tort I'd seen there and the last in the box. I was given a discount on him. He has had the hardest time, due to my ignorance. I was originally keeping him in an open sweater box and he declined over the last several months. I had read somewhere that baby torts slept throughout the day so chalked it off to normal behavior. But he stopped eating regularly (3 weeks ago) and I started to pay closer attention, and at this point started to consume any information I could find on the species. I now know that he was in a completely wrong enclosure. I got him in to see an exotics vet (1 week ago. Could not get him in any sooner) and he was diagnosed with a RI and I was given some instructions on updating his care, but the real gold mine was when I found the caresheets on here. Hes now in a much larger closed chamber and I've been monitoring humidity, ambient and basking temps to meet the given specifications. I've also started taking him out to sun on warmer, sunny days for an hour or two at a time (while I'm there to guard him) for full spectrum sunlight, which he seems to enjoy. He's still undergoing treatment and recovery and I'm still researching...but I will post more about him in detail here soon, with pictures, in the right forum/thread/section. We named him Leo because my older brother insisted on naming him after a ninja turtle. Which isn't too original but it's fitting. I think of him like a little lion sometimes. He's pretty tough for something so puny.

Though I've kind of struggled with keeping turtles and torts, I really enjoy them and I'm trying to do better by them. They've also, especially with Venus being wild caught, have got me looking into conservation and volunteering (I did an essay recently and, if I remember correctly, of the 356 species there's roughly 61% that are endangered due to habitat loss, climate change and poaching for food, medicinal and illegal wildlife trafficking).

Now that I've written you all a small novel to read, I'll give your eyes a rest and post this thing. I am really looking forward to getting to know everyone and learning from everyone's experiences.

Thanks for having me!
Welcome! I absolutely love history and art ❤️. I can't wait to see pictures of your babies I have 4 water turtles. I have a yearling snapping turtle who is now big enough to be let go next year and 2 baby snappers and my little bubba. Who is a blandings turtle. I hatched him this year and thought he was a boxie.. I have a cat named Cali two dogs named Barney and shastapop. And I have 2 terrors for children my son is 3 and his name is Mark the 3 and I have baby girl Maxine who is 1 1/2. Looking forward to learning more about you and you're family.
 
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