Brackish vs. Freshwater???
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OK, an oldie, but a goodie! There’s a fairly hot topic going on at Turtle Forum right now, and I was hoping to hear from some folks that have been at the hobby for a while. For all the folks that keep their DB’s in freshwater, how long have you been in the hobby or HOW OLD IS YOUR OLDEST DIAMONDBACK? The reason I ask is that the “debate” is that clean, well-filtered FRESHWATER is fine for young DB’s, but one person is suggesting that our DB’s will NEVER live long, full lives in Freshwater tanks. He believes that ONLY DB’s that are kept in a Brackish tank will live a full life (20 to 40 years). I would like to believe that that is not true since my guys are basically kept in Freshwater (1 tbls. of salt per 5 gallons). So what is your take on this? Does anyone have any OLD Freshwater DB’s?
OK Jimbo let’s see if any of these could be of use to you. I consider that my DBTs have lived their lives in freshwater even if they get weekly baths of sea salt (Instant Ocean). I tried different concentrations during the years but never to the point in which it could be considered actual brackish water. At this point I only use 1/4 cup of sea salt for the 4 gallons of water I use in their Rubbermaid sweater box that I use for this. They only spend around 3 to 4 hours in this water. I got my first terrapin (wild caught male) in 1978 from a fish market. At that time I did not even know what is was and he was raised with RES in tap water. He was very restless at the beginning but eventually he adapted well to his new environment. Miracuously he never got sick during his lifetime. He was very healthy when died in June of 1999. His death was caused by a mortal bite to his neck by a musk turtle. I found him dead and it seems he drowned after the bite. He lived for 21 years in freshwater even if he started his then mild weekly salt water baths in 1986 as I started to learn more about them. Now, I currently have a female (centrata) and a male (tequesta). My female was ordered from Florida by a pet store in 1986 (22 years ago) and I received an old turtle who already had survived and accident that caused her a large crack on her carapace. Because of her advanced age and condition it is almost certainly that she was wild caught as well. It was extremely difficult for her to adapt to her new environment and I had a lot of health problems with her. That’s when I started testing with the sea salt baths and she finally adapted to her new environment with the help of the weekly baths. Her actual age was estimated to 40-50 years by a vet a very long time ago. I already have her for 22 years and I could say she actually lives in freshwater with the exception of those hours during the weekend. I got my new adult male terrapin in 1990. Been with me for 18 years and the same freshwater environment. I don’t know if he was wild caught or not but he was easier than my female with his new environment. I have dealt with fungus and shell rot at certain times (especially with the female) and I do think that the weekly sea salt bath was fundamental for their recovery. It is sad to say but the most serious problems my turtles experienced were caused by inexperienced vets and not freshwater. A piece of information that could perhaps be of value to you is that I had a complete blood count done for both of my current terrapins. Both of their results fall within the only available reference range values of wild terrapins. I read in Werner’s 2007 studies that sodium values should be interpreted according to the terrapins environmental salinity. Both of my freshwater terrapin had very similar results which fall very well to their wild counterparts. Apparently wild terrapin goes through different salinity levels during the day. I guess if they are able to do this at will during the day keeping them constantly at one salinity level could be a lot more stressful to them than having them in a freshwater environment with an option to sea water at times. Another interesting finding is that both males and females terrapins seem to have very similar sodium blood concentrations while in other values females and males show differences. My female and male sodium values are basically the same. I read in the past that males terrapins due to their smaller size and food habits stayed in closer range of lower salinity while females with their bigger size often venture far into the ocean to feed and are exposed to higher salinity levels. So it really looks that they do move around and regulate their salinity. Well, I personally think a freshwater environment is safer for them than constant brackish water. In real brackish water they could not drink freshwater at will or move to other salinity levels when needed. Ada 🙂 — In diamondbackterrapins@yahoogroups.com, “jimbo_craig”
Ada, Thanks SO much for your very informative reply! Great feedback…………….I agree that, ideally, a DB setup should always have Freshwater available to them. OK, Ada has several Freshwater guys that have made it into their 20’s and on………………Anyone else???
— In diamondbackterrapins@yahoogroups.com, “Jimbo Craig”
Great story Steve, even though it had a sad ending, but I guess we all have to go sometime! They say going in your sleep is the way to go, so it sounds like your grand OLD gal went rather peacefully. 30 plus years in nothing but Freshwater………………and to start out in those horrible conditions, she did pretty darn good!!!
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