Rescue turtles

[Fiona]

Hey I recently rescued 2 turtles (previous owner wanted to bin them) and I'm wanting to build them a pond in my garden I'm looking for guidance on what to do I've spoken to the reptile people near me and they said the bath is fine for now considering the were in a small fish tank before I got them
Thanks
Fiona

 

[TheFishGuy]

Just want to make sure you have the basics down for caring for them before we move on to pond ideas. Are you using dechlorinator in the water? What are you feeding them? do they have a heat bulb? What about UVB? I am sure I missed some important factors as I have never cared for turtles, but these are a few things that are common needs for many reptiles.

As far as pond ideas go, how large are you thinking? somewhere in the 300 gallon range, or somewhere in the 3000 gallon range? After we have size figured out, the filtration would be a next step. An upflow wetland filter would be a great option on any pond, and there are some great builds and articles on here about them. And finally what types of waterfall, fountian, or other features were you thinking of adding?

 

[Mmathis]

Hello and welcome. Keep in mind a few things about turtles (are these red eared sliders?) : 1) they make a lot of waste, so you will need a good filtration system, 2) they are escape artists, so anything outside will HAVE to be escape-proof (they climb and they dig); 3) they need UV light; 4) do some research on their diet — just from the pictures, those guys don’t look like they’ve had the best of care. Diet is very importan!

My turtles are box turtles, so I don’t know a lot about keeping aquatic turtles. We do have a few in this group who do keep turtles, so hopefully they will chime in.

 

[j.w]

@Fiona

 

[exeter]

Hi Fiona,

Thank you for rescuing these turtles! Just wondering about an update. Please let us know.

 

[j.w]

@exeter

 

[Mmathis]

Hi Fiona,

Thank you for rescuing these turtles! Just wondering about an update. Please let us know.

Hi @exeter! Hello and welcome!