Pyramiding a problem for water turtles?

Freddy90

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Read a lot of posts here about pyramiding and that it has to do with the wrong humidity and strong lights.
But all I read is tortoises obviously this is mainly a tortoise forum but can someone tell me if my spotted turtle can pyramid also?

Keeping him outside with the real sun no lights
 

Pastel Tortie

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Read a lot of posts here about pyramiding and that it has to do with the wrong humidity and strong lights.
But all I read is tortoises obviously this is mainly a tortoise forum but can someone tell me if my spotted turtle can pyramid also?

Keeping him outside with the real sun no lights
Pyramiding is due to lack of proper humidity. Not a problem for turtle species kept in water. ?
 

Markw84

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PYramiding can be an issue with young aquatic turtles. They often go a few years before they will start regularly shedding their scutes and they can get a pyramided look in that time. With spotted turtles in particular it is easy to tell a captive raised young spotted as they almost always are a bit pyramided. Being kept outside, you will likely have much less of this and can grow quite normal "wild" looking turtles.

This is not the same pyramiding as with tortoises as aquatic turtles do shed their scutes regularly. They add keratin to the entire underside of the growing scute and the old, top layer sheds off. A tortoise only adds new keratin to the expanding seam at the scute edge. So with a tortoise the way the scute grows is permanent. With an aquatic it will successively shed old keratin layers and a "pyramided" aqutic will eventually become quite smooth as the pyramiding was actually from retained scutes.

Some of the mechanism of the "pyramiding" is the same and intense IR and too hot a basking area contribute to this issue with young turtles. I grow my young spotted turtles quite smooth now and most cannot tell they are captive bred and raised. Using some of the same priciples I do with creating basking areas for tortoises has made this possible.

Keep in mind this is not permanent with a healthy aquatic, though. With proper diet and care, they will start their shedding sequences and the shell does smooth out and become very "normal/wild" looking.

As an example, my cooters I leave to grow in my outdoor pond after head starting some indoors their first winter. I've been keeping this same line of cooters for over 36 years now with no new ones added to my pond - just new generations. I am on at least 6 generations of Suwanee Cooters in my pond now.

Here's a photo of a baby about 6 months old that is quite rough looking. It was before I made most of my changes to basking areas, so you can see the rough look to the carapace. This was very common with them their first year or so. Next is a picture of a 3 year old - normally looking quite smooth by then. Finally a picture of a 7-8 year old looking very normal and "wild" looking. So even a rough start does smooth out with aquatics.

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Freddy90

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Austria
PYramiding can be an issue with young aquatic turtles. They often go a few years before they will start regularly shedding their scutes and they can get a pyramided look in that time. With spotted turtles in particular it is easy to tell a captive raised young spotted as they almost always are a bit pyramided. Being kept outside, you will likely have much less of this and can grow quite normal "wild" looking turtles.

This is not the same pyramiding as with tortoises as aquatic turtles do shed their scutes regularly. They add keratin to the entire underside of the growing scute and the old, top layer sheds off. A tortoise only adds new keratin to the expanding seam at the scute edge. So with a tortoise the way the scute grows is permanent. With an aquatic it will successively shed old keratin layers and a "pyramided" aqutic will eventually become quite smooth as the pyramiding was actually from retained scutes.

Some of the mechanism of the "pyramiding" is the same and intense IR and too hot a basking area contribute to this issue with young turtles. I grow my young spotted turtles quite smooth now and most cannot tell they are captive bred and raised. Using some of the same priciples I do with creating basking areas for tortoises has made this possible.

Keep in mind this is not permanent with a healthy aquatic, though. With proper diet and care, they will start their shedding sequences and the shell does smooth out and become very "normal/wild" looking.

As an example, my cooters I leave to grow in my outdoor pond after head starting some indoors their first winter. I've been keeping this same line of cooters for over 36 years now with no new ones added to my pond - just new generations. I am on at least 6 generations of Suwanee Cooters in my pond now.

Here's a photo of a baby about 6 months old that is quite rough looking. It was before I made most of my changes to basking areas, so you can see the rough look to the carapace. This was very common with them their first year or so. Next is a picture of a 3 year old - normally looking quite smooth by then. Finally a picture of a 7-8 year old looking very normal and "wild" looking. So even a rough start does smooth out with aquatics.

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Thank u so much for taking the time and writing all this! :) This is really calming me down cause I saw some really bad pyramiding tortoises recently and didn't wanted it to happen to my baby.
and u got a really nice pond and beautiful turtles :) :)
 

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