# unknown reason for baby turtle death



## charles_316

I am sad to say that one of my baby turtles (redbelly turtle) has just died last night for unknown reasons. I was hoping to see if any of you had any input as to why. I don't have pictures on me right now but can upload them later if needed.

I had two baby turtles - one red belly turtle and one red eared slider both in a 20g tank together. I have 3 adult red eared sliders that I have taken care of for 13 years in a separate 80 g tank that are doing fine.

I've had the two baby turtles for 2-3 weeks and they have seemed very happy since arriving.

- 20g tank
- brand new heater kept the water at ~24-25 degrees. 
- water was filled to approximately 4 inches with filtered water (no water conditioner used)
- heat lamp plus basking spots. the turtles loved to bask on the rock in the corner as well as climb up a very nice piece of driftwood that went completely out of the water. 
- air stone in the corner so that there was some water movement

The red-eared slider is still alive - I have immediately removed the dead redbelly turtle and changed the water.

The most annoying thing that bugs me is that I have no idea why he died. I have a couple possibilities:

1) I'm going on vacation for a week so I decided to bring the tank and turtles to my girlfriend's place so she can take care of them when I am gone. We moved them to her house last night. Ironically, the turtle died today at 3pm. The turtles did not seem stressed during the 10 min ride. They were moved into a separate container from the tank in the car ride to the house. And when we set up the tank at her house, both turtles were eating and looking fine. But could there have been too much stress involved and caused a heart attack more than 12 hours later?

2) I did not have a filter since the water level was kept very low for them. Instead, I just manually changed water. The water was average when he died. There were a couple uneaten small pieces of shrimp that should have been removed but overall, it looked to be fine. A couple days earlier, I noticed some mold growing on the second piece of driftwood so I removed this piece. Could the cause of death have been water parameters even though the other turtle is still alive and I did manual changes and removed the piece of driftwood that mold grew on?

3) Very unusual - My girlfriend and I noticed two days ago that the redbelly turtle was basking on the driftwood and doing some really wierd "yawning". The turtle would every now and then open its mouth very wide (looked very strange and unnatural) and then close it right away. We tried catching it on video but missed. We managed to get a picture from the side but wasn't too good. I can post this later if it helps. Is it possible he didn't chew his food enough so he couldnt digest it properly or something? Anyone know the reason for these strange "yawns"? Other than these yawns, the turtles looked very healthy and were eating daily. They were fed very tiny shrimps (literally baby shrimps) that were recommended from the store. I don't have them on hand but could give the exact make and name if necessary later.

Any info would be greatly appreciated. I have never seen a turtle die. Today is a sad day









Charles


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## Mettle

Red ear sliders can be quite aggressive. There is a good chance it bullied the other turtle so that it was getting less basking time and food. This combination could have lead to the other turtle's death.

Also, red ear sliders are swimmers. You can keep that water level much higher with them. I'm not familiar with the "red bellied" turtle you're talking about but I'm guessing it's referring to a _Pseudemys sp._ of red bellied turtle, and if so, they also are good swimmers and will love to have as much water as you can provide them with. The red bellied turtles I believe feed more on veggies while the red ears, if I'm not mistaken, tend to be a bit more carnivorous. So there might have been a dietary issue keeping them together.

Lastly... Missing from your list of things was the uvb light. Do you have one and if not currently have you ever? Turtles require uvb light. But I think you know that as I remember a thread somewhere where I mentioned this and in another thread you mentioned it too.

The transporting shouldn't have caused an issue unless they were exposed to extreme cold for an extended period.


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## ...Jay...

I dont think uv would have played a roll sense he just got these. Thats more of a slow process of killing an animal.

My first though would be temp. If he is "yawning" under the light, I know beardies do that as a way of regulating temp to a certain degree without having to move spots constantly. Dunno if turtles do this or not? For a change to kill him that fast, I would assume its a temperature issue, in which case you need to get a good temp gauge on the basking area asap to make sure the other turtle isn't at risk. Laying an aquarium thermometer there doesn't really cut it as that ends up measuring the temperature of the air right above the area. You want to know what the temperature is of what they are sitting on. Something with a lazer or a probe works much better.

do you turn the lights/heater off at night? If so I'd at least leave the heater on.

does her house get more or less hot than yours did at night?


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## ...Jay...

One more thing. Dont listen to pet store people. Most of them are retarded when it comes to the animals they sell. The dried up baby shrimps your referring to have almost 0 nutritional value, and they love them to the point of becoming addicted and sometimes refuse to eat anything else for weeks. Although I doubt it played a major role in the death, a change in diet is necessary as quickly as possible. Babies are more carnivorous than adults, slowly eating more and more vegetation as they grow. Just google red eared slider diet, or something similar and you'll find a bunch of things that will be better for your turtle.

theres nothing wrong with the lack of filtration as long as they have plenty of water changes and your using dechlorifier of some sort. I just bought a res a few days ago(size of a .50 piece) for my son and am doing the same thing. I have a turkey baster thingy that I use to take the left over food out and about half the remaining water, then just top it off daily.


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## charles_316

Thanks for the responses.

First off, I doubt it is the UV light - as Jayson said, I have only had the baby turtles for two weeks. I do have UV lighting for the adult turtles but had not bought the UV light for the baby turtles yet.

I agree the turtle could not have died from the car ride. It was very short and he was not faced with any extreme temperatures.

As for diet, the redbelly turtle was eating much more than the red-eared slider since the red-eared slider preferred to hide and was much more shy than the redbelly. I really liked the redbelly turtle because he wasn't scared when he moved up to the glass to watch him, etc. He seemed extremely healthy and moved a lot.

The water level was at a comfortable level. There was enough room for them to swim and also so that they could crawl out and bask on the rock or driftwood.

I was EXTREMELY surprised to see this turtle die. I am still very suspicious of the "yawning" - it looked very unnatural - like sneezing almost.

I have been told by several people that red-eared sliders can live with different turtles of similar size. I have even seen this on websites before. What is strange to me is that whenever I saw the two together, they were always friendly - basking on top of each other, basking beside each other - I never saw any aggressive behaviour between them. HOWEVER, I definitely would not rule out this possibility since this was such a sudden death - it is possible even though I have never seen any indications towards this.

I am narrowing down the possibilities to:

1) Red-eared slider suddenly became aggressive on the redbelly for some reason and killed him (how would he actually kill the redbelly? scratch? cause extreme stress?)
2) Something to do with the yawning incident. Maybe that meant something was wrong internally? I have no clue. Maybe this is normal - can anyone confirm?

Keep the input coming. I am debating purchasing another redbelly in the future but if this one died b/c of the red eared, i will not put them together. Aren't red-eared sliders supposed to be "community" turtles?

Thanks,

Charles


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## Mettle

charles_316 said:


> Aren't red-eared sliders supposed to be "community" turtles?


To a certain extent. But they are more aggressive than a lot of the other turtles that people keep as pets. That's why they out compete a lot of the native species across North America when they're released into local water ways.

The uvb could be an issue if the animals were improperly kept at the pet store or where ever you got them from. But as concluded it's probably not the main concern.

Were you removing harmful additives in the water? In your first post you said you didn't add anything to the water. This could potentially harm the turtles depending on what is added to the water in your area.


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## charles_316

I did not use straight tap water. It was from an expensive filtering system we have.

I was debating whether or not to use de-chlorinator/water conditioner but no one answered my post on here and I thought it would be best not to use it w/o a filter.


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