I apologize for the short introduction and the length of this post but I'm kind of worried so if nobody minds I am going to just jump right in here. This is Pablo. From what I have looked up I believe he/she is a Painted turtle. We obtained him when he wandered into our yard about a week ago. He is very friendly and seems to have taken the transition pretty well. I am not an expert but I believe he may have a fungus due to not basking an appropriate amount of time. He also has some marks on his back that I have been wondering about. I have posted photos below.
He/She lives here:
It's a 30 gallon tank with ten gallons of water in it being filtered by a 40 gallon tetra pump filter. The lamp is an exo-terra + glow with a 100 watt exo-terra uv bulb. There is a zoo-med floating dock and the substrate is some of the bigger aquarium gravel you can get (temporary arrangement until we can replace it with a chunkier substrate.
The water temperature stays between 75 and 80 degrees and is currently at 76. We use county water which oddly enough consistently tests at a neutral PH. We test PH everyday and remove part of the water and add new every few days to keep the PH as consistent as possible. We use sera aquatan to condition the water. We bought a smaller tank today for feeding him in order to keep the water fresher.
He is eating about ten sera raffy p pellets twice a day and four or five sera raffy I dried anchovies and ant eggs. He has a few Elodea plants floating in there as well. I was told they loved them but I have never seen the turtle eat them. He sure does like to sleep with them though. He has had like a total of five worms in the last week and the girls put two grasshoppers in there which I do not see any longer but can not confirm he ate.
He appears to want to be at his basking spot but he only gets up there for a few moments and then dives back into the water. I tested his basking spot with an oven thermometer (not a meat thermometer but one you actually set inside the oven) and it appears to be reading at 100 degrees, maybe a tad bit higher. I moved his light over until I got a reading that looked closer to being between 80 and 90 degrees. I'm thinking that this has been the root of the problem if indeed there is one so I suppose my first question is: Is 100-110 degrees too high and will that prevent them from basking for an appropriate amount of time? I have left the light on pretty much 24/7 because he hasn't been on his floaty much and I didn't want to turn it off and him just be shy and want to bask while we were sleeping.
My second concern is mainly confirming that this is indeed a fungus and maybe seeing if anyone knows how far progressed it is. We soaked him in the zoo-med sulfa dip today for the entire three hours and per the directions put him in his tank after a 1/2 water change.
I apologize for the crumby photos. I haven't quite mastered the aquarium snaps yet and used an 800 iso. The fuzzy stuff looks more like maybe.. slimy mud when he is out of water in the heavier spots. In the lighter affected areas you can not see it at all. When I first thought he might have the fungus I put some aquarium salt in his water. I described it as "like the ick that fish get" to the pet shop and was told that he may just be developing a slime coat due to the PH being off and that the salt was really bad for him (conflicting information?) so I changed his water. Even after making sure the PH is right (it has been about five days) the fuzzy stuff is getting thicker.
And last but not least, here is a photo of the marks on the back of his shell. Could this possibly be shedding or is it something else?
If you made it this far, I really appreciate you taking the time to read it all. I apologize again for the length but I wanted to make sure I provided as much information as possible. I've never had a turtle as a pet before so I am mainly going by what the local pet shop told me to use/do and what I have read on the internet. I am mainly concerned about the fuzzy stuff because it's the only thing I know to be concerned about. The more information I can get about other things I may need to be concerned about the better but any little hints, tips, and ideas will definitely be appreciated.
Thanks!
-Tina
He/She lives here:
It's a 30 gallon tank with ten gallons of water in it being filtered by a 40 gallon tetra pump filter. The lamp is an exo-terra + glow with a 100 watt exo-terra uv bulb. There is a zoo-med floating dock and the substrate is some of the bigger aquarium gravel you can get (temporary arrangement until we can replace it with a chunkier substrate.
The water temperature stays between 75 and 80 degrees and is currently at 76. We use county water which oddly enough consistently tests at a neutral PH. We test PH everyday and remove part of the water and add new every few days to keep the PH as consistent as possible. We use sera aquatan to condition the water. We bought a smaller tank today for feeding him in order to keep the water fresher.
He is eating about ten sera raffy p pellets twice a day and four or five sera raffy I dried anchovies and ant eggs. He has a few Elodea plants floating in there as well. I was told they loved them but I have never seen the turtle eat them. He sure does like to sleep with them though. He has had like a total of five worms in the last week and the girls put two grasshoppers in there which I do not see any longer but can not confirm he ate.
He appears to want to be at his basking spot but he only gets up there for a few moments and then dives back into the water. I tested his basking spot with an oven thermometer (not a meat thermometer but one you actually set inside the oven) and it appears to be reading at 100 degrees, maybe a tad bit higher. I moved his light over until I got a reading that looked closer to being between 80 and 90 degrees. I'm thinking that this has been the root of the problem if indeed there is one so I suppose my first question is: Is 100-110 degrees too high and will that prevent them from basking for an appropriate amount of time? I have left the light on pretty much 24/7 because he hasn't been on his floaty much and I didn't want to turn it off and him just be shy and want to bask while we were sleeping.
My second concern is mainly confirming that this is indeed a fungus and maybe seeing if anyone knows how far progressed it is. We soaked him in the zoo-med sulfa dip today for the entire three hours and per the directions put him in his tank after a 1/2 water change.
I apologize for the crumby photos. I haven't quite mastered the aquarium snaps yet and used an 800 iso. The fuzzy stuff looks more like maybe.. slimy mud when he is out of water in the heavier spots. In the lighter affected areas you can not see it at all. When I first thought he might have the fungus I put some aquarium salt in his water. I described it as "like the ick that fish get" to the pet shop and was told that he may just be developing a slime coat due to the PH being off and that the salt was really bad for him (conflicting information?) so I changed his water. Even after making sure the PH is right (it has been about five days) the fuzzy stuff is getting thicker.
And last but not least, here is a photo of the marks on the back of his shell. Could this possibly be shedding or is it something else?
If you made it this far, I really appreciate you taking the time to read it all. I apologize again for the length but I wanted to make sure I provided as much information as possible. I've never had a turtle as a pet before so I am mainly going by what the local pet shop told me to use/do and what I have read on the internet. I am mainly concerned about the fuzzy stuff because it's the only thing I know to be concerned about. The more information I can get about other things I may need to be concerned about the better but any little hints, tips, and ideas will definitely be appreciated.
Thanks!
-Tina