Hello,
I currently have 2 juvenile turtles, one a painted turtle and the other a RES. The painted turtle (Vic) is about 2.5 inches long, and the RES (Sam) is about 4 inches long. They have been kept together in the same tank for a year now, and recently Vic has shown many signs of agression towards Sam. The other day, while Sam was basking and had his tail outstretched, Vic came up behind him and took a chunk of skin off. The wound from that day has healed, but Vic keeps biting his tail, reopening the wound, but not to the extent of the first bite. In addition, just this morning Vic bit Sam's front leg, and although he broke no skin and did no damage, this agression worries me. After the first tail bite we moved them from a 20 gallon tank into a 40 gallon, and although attacks have been less frequent in the bigger tank, the little painted turtle keeps biting the RES. We currently have gravel and a turtle dock in the 40 gallon tank, and have filled it about a quarter of the way with water. We got Vic about 2 months after Sam, but Sam is much older than Vic. Therefore, could Vic be trying to establish dominance? And if so, when will this end? And if it's not dominance, what else could it be? I'm desperate for help, because I want to keep them healthy and we are moving later this month.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
