# snapping turtle pond



## traumatic (Jan 29, 2003)

recent pic of my snappers pond.

It's a 140 gal tuff tub w/ a magdrive 1200 pump powering the DIY 5gal bucket filter.

View attachment 112820


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## brutusbeefcake (Dec 8, 2004)

damnit thats awesome dude... lets get a better shot of the snapper... i think i see him?


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## CrocKeeper (Dec 26, 2003)

Nice! I love when they get more footprint than an aquarium!!!


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## acestro (Jul 7, 2003)

Agreed. Remarkable aquascaping too!


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## traumatic (Jan 29, 2003)

Thanks He surely loves it in there.

crocKeeper, Your back! I guess I am too, I've been absent lately.


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## oscared15 (Feb 3, 2006)

awesome, a friend of mine has a large snapper, that's in a 220 gallon tank.


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## traumatic (Jan 29, 2003)

here's a quick profile

The tub : 140 gal tuff tub
The filter: DIY 5 gal bucket filter (ac 5000 powerhead)

Filter








Bulkhead








Bio Basket








Lava rock bed








Filter sponge container








Sponge container inserted into overflow bucket








Overflow bucket inserted into 5g bucket








Pump (ac 5000 power head)








Filter working









and now for the tub









Here is a working diagram









The tub is in my basement on the floor, I plan to raise it up off the ground about 18" and put a deck around it. I also want to box in the filter and utilize the drain on the tub. Right now it's a rough draft so to speak but will eventually be pretty sweet. ~thmbu

I'm open to suggestions so please feel free to be critical.


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## ESPMike (Mar 23, 2005)

Wow great setup. Looks like a great way to keep a turtle since it gives all that extra space. And the DIY filter is a great idea, Ive never seen one like that before. Impressive setup!


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## traumatic (Jan 29, 2003)

Thanks

The filter works very well. It'd be hard to copy this one because the parts I used were laying around the house, but I'm sure you could build one for about $20 or less not including the pump.


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## acestro (Jul 7, 2003)

Great filter, how hard do you think it would be to clean? My recollections are that turtles are very, very dirty critters!


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## CrocKeeper (Dec 26, 2003)

Great mechanical filter...depending on how many buckets you filtered through could be a wicked biological filter as well...for less moolah than buying some fancy trickle boogar!

I hope all of you potential waterfall/pond/running water herp enthusiasts copied the diagram!
Well Done traumatic..


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## traumatic (Jan 29, 2003)

Acestro - I've only cleaned it two times since It's been setup. It's very easy to clean. I just unplug the pump, remove the lid. The filter floss and sponge pads in the inside 1 gallon bucket is all the gets rinsed or replaced. I also stuffed some more filter floss (actually about half a bag of pillow stuffing) around the inside bucket for good measure. It can be a pain if I take it all the way apart because the 1 gal bucket sets on a layer of lava rocks and there's some lava rocks are packed around the inside between the 1 gal buck and the 5 gal bucket that will fall down and have to be repacked. So I just take the media out of the 1 gal w/out removing it completely. 
The turtle is still small right now so this filter will be adequate for a while. I will need to beef it up for the future. I may also just give him a bigger enclosure w/ a larger biomass filter.

crockeeper - thanks couldn't have been done w/out a little research. The coolest part about it is that it's airtight and completely silent. I haven't even thought of hooking up a series of these. Might be a good idea when he gets bigger. It's not flawless by any means although a very sucessful first try. Actually second try if you count the POS stacked drawer, trickle wetdry I made that overflowed about 5 times.


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## BLUEDIAMONDRHOM (Jul 19, 2006)

i got a pond with a couple young snappers

i catch maybe 4-5 20 pound snappers a year and like 10 babies


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## BLUEDIAMONDRHOM (Jul 19, 2006)

BLUEDIAMONDRHOM said:


> i got a pond with a couple young snappers
> 
> i catch maybe 4-5 20 pound snappers a year and like 10 babies


wow great setup though! what subspecie do you have?


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## robert b (Nov 1, 2005)

wow awesome setup


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## piranha5150 (Jul 27, 2006)

Looks nice, do you have any lights for him?


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