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[Todd Stockwell]

Todd Stockwell

September 30, 2000 at 2:07 pm #13412

Hello, DBT keepers! I just joined yesterday and finally had a chance to go through the back list of previous postings. We’ve been keeping DBTS for only one and a half years, but they are by far our favorites. We have 14 DBTs amongst about 100 turtles currently in our collection. We have centratas, northerns and Texas ranging from hatchlings to large adults. We’re trying to get one or more breeding groups together for when we can move them into some outdoor ponds. We’ve had no problems raising hatchling DBTs with other similar sized turtles of various species. Size seems to be the most important factor followed by how aggressively each individual eats. We’ve had some hatchling DBTs from different parents beat up on one another and some tail nipping. Once we separated them into different tanks with other species of hatchlings, we’ve had no problems. We’ve been keeping some hatchling mud and musk turtles in each tank to clean up the bottom while the DBTs, sliders and paints eat at the surface (sending lots of crunched up pellets to the bottom). We’ve had good luck following Rick Van Dyke’s suggestion of keeping plastic vines in the hatchling tanks for them to hide in and rest in as well as a floating basking island. I raised a tiny Texas DBT hatchling alone for about three months and then put him in with a hatchling red eared slider, a juvenile razorback musk and an adult three striped musk. Those four males got along well for over a year. I just separated them into breeding groups of their own kind since we acquired some females of each type. The Texas DBT is now almost four inches at one and a half years as he eats everything in the tank. He preferred ghost shrimp and crickets as a hatchling, but I switched him over to Baby Reptomin and he ignores all live food now as long as pellets are offered. He’s currently in a tank with two centratas and a northern. The other three took almost three months to get onto pellets, but now they won’t stop begging for Aquamax troutchow. Our DBTs seem particularly messy compared to most other species as they seem to crunch the trout chow pellets and various other brands in their mouths more than other species that just swallow the pellets whole. Probably because of their natural diet of mollusks and other crunchy critters? We have one large, aged centrata female who has refused to eat anything except live nightcrawlers. We finally tried fresh oysters and she loved those, of course. Now she’s stuck on smelt and shrimp – but ONLY if hand fed. She ignores it if we toss it into the water. She’ll jump for the smelt and swallow them whole like Shamu at Seaworld. I put four or five popcorn shrimp on a toothpick and she “daintily” plucks the shrimp off and begs for more. She’s definitely spoiled, but since she refused to eat for so long I’m playing her game for a while, at least. The most interesting pair we have came through a snake dealer who took them in trade and wanted to sell them quickly as he didn’t deal in turtles. He said they were very freindly, but what DBT isn’t? Well, this pair is amzaing. They’ll follow you around the house like a pair of puppies. The male insists on climbling up into your lap if you sit on the floor and likes to sit in your lap or on your chest. They both are tremedous beggers and will eat virtually anything offered from your hand, in the water or out, including watermellon and strawberries. The female is a grey carolina centrata, but the male is a little different. He’s VERY flat like a pancake. His shell is black and very rough but well formed. His head is white with black dots like many northerns. The only other DBT I’ve seen that was this flat was an all gray one at a nature center in Connecticut. Anyone have any more info. on these very flat DBTs? Are they just individuals or do they come from particular populations? Our latest DBTs are two Texas hatchlings. They have the enlarged “knobs” on their shell ridges. We’re still looking for Texas with the blue heads. We’ve tried mixing up brackish water and none of our DBTs seem particularly fond of any mixture we’ve tried. They tolerate it o.k., but they really seem to suck in fresh water when they are returned to it. So we’re just using fresh on them for now. We’ve been tossing in cuttlebones and the large females seem particularly interested in cruching on them. Do other keepers break or grind cuttlebones before putting them in the water? I think this group is a great idea! Looking forward to reading the postings. Todd Stockwell Brenham, Texas

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