dbt found
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Help! We found a dbt in the yard of a vacant rent property. She’s beautiful and about 8 inches long, but that is all we know about it. We have taken her to several pet stores and no one seems to be familiar with her, luckily my husband is a University of Maryland fan. Any feedback would be helpful: is it a good pet; high/low maint.; food; shelter; indoor/outdoor; bare necessities to long term. Please give any information you have on the care and feeding of Myrtle.
Candace, You may want to check with your state laws. Many new england coastal states have it as illegal to possess a DBT as a pet (unfortunately) without a permit (which can only be obtained for approved “projects”. It’s a hassle from my experience. There are many DBT conservation projects around and I know of a couple in MA as well and in CT. -= Chris ———- Original Message ———————————- From: “candacehomepc
I am a University of Maryland graduate…. Diamondbacks make wonderful pets. They are friendly and hardy. You should post a pic of your guest. If you can’t or don’t want to keep it, there are plenty of folks who will. Best of luck. At 04:27 PM 2/3/03 +0000, you wrote:
There are many folks on this list who can respond to your questions. All of your questions have been discussed/debated at length on this list in the past if you have a little time to review the message archives. Please feel free to ask whatever questions you have though, and I’m sure members will respond as time allows. This is a very passionate and knowledgeable group of dbt fans! However, to get started, I’ll try to respond to some of the issues. This list is dedicated to the captive propagation of dbts and so most here would not recommend taking an apparently healthy breeding-size female from the wild. Does she appear healthy and relatively heavy? I do wonder why she was in a yard this time of year rather than buried in the mud awaiting warmer weather? Captive hatched dbts make wonderfully active and responsive pets. Multi-generation captive breeding has been very successful. Captive hatched dbts can do well on commerical pellet diets, can be kept in fresh water, and do not require any more specialized care or equipment (filtration, lighting, etc.) than other aquatic turtles (all of which are relatively expensive to set up, compared to some other reptile pets, though). Wild caughts in general are higher maintenance. A number of us on the list have been working with wild caughts obtained from fish markets and other “terminal” sources to try to establish them as captive breeders. Although each keeper has their own preferences and successes, I think wild caughts generally are more difficult to impossible to get onto commerical pellet diets and most tend to have skin and shell problems if they are not kept in brackish water. There are exceptional individuals who don’t and there are ways to overcome the difficulties, however. Wild caught female dbts in particular seem difficult to get to accept anything other than fresh or thawed seafoods (shrimp, smelt, squid, periwinkle snails, etc.). Their large mouths are meant for crushing snails, blue crabs, etc. Some can be acclimated to pellets or gelatin block diets, especially if first soaked in their favorite seafood item such as shrimp. Care questions are subject to never ending debate. However, here are a few of my thoughts on your situation. An eight inch female terrapin is a good sized turtle and will require a large tank or trough for long term care with a good filter. She will need a sturdy basking area to get completely out of the water to dry off and a heat source (usually an incandescent light bulb) to bask under. Flourescent UV light or a combination self-ballasted mercury heat and UV lamp should be added to the set up. Real sunshine is always beneficial whether it is intermittment or her “pond” can be set up outdoors during the warmer months. One issue in the short term to decide is whether to warm her up indoors to the point that she becomes active and wants to eat or to leave her in “cool down” mode in which case she will not begin to eat again until the outdoor temps start to rise. Which way to go may be decided by her health. If she shows any respiratory problems or other signs of illness, then those need to be addressed before forcing hibernation. I’m sure some will advocate returning her to the wild if at all possible if her health appears good, assuming she hasn’t been in contact with any other captive turtles (which could have transmitted unknown diseases). Should you decide to do that, please consider obtaining a captive bred dbt or possibly adopting a rehab dbt that can’t be returned to the wild as dbts do make wonderful shelled companions! I’m sure others will post their thoughts. Let us know how things are working out. Todd “candacehomepc
Hey ya’ll, Thank you for responding so soon. I guess I should expound on my initial msg. The renters put in a small pond in the backyard and I was cleaning out the gunk and mire and found a half dead fish. I thought it was a Choi and took it to the pet store…it was a big goldfish (she’s doing well now). They said to make sure there weren’t any more fish in the pond, since having one fish is odd. There weren’t any fish, but there was Myrtle in the corner covered with grass and stuff. She’s currently in the tub and I let her roam the yard for a couple hours yesterday and today. So, I don’t believe she’s from the “wild” exactly nor has she eaten anything since we found her. Being a mom, that is very worrisome to me. The people at the pet store said I need at least a 75 gallon tank for her. Does that sound right??? She seems healthy, so where do I let her hibernate??? We’re in Texas, would it be best to put a small pen/pond in the yard for now? And if she’s outside, how do I provide heat? Oh, so many questions… There are several aquatic pet stores in the phone book, but when I called they were out of business. So, you all are the only source of competent info. I have currently. Thank you again for your help! — In diamondbackterrapins@yahoogroups.com, Todd Stockwell
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