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Help! How to feed my turtle vegetable?!

PostPosted: Sat Oct 30, 2010 5:49 pm
by Dodoturtle
HI! How to entice my adult turtle to take in vegetable?
I've had my adult RES for a month right now. I usually feed him pellet and frozen fish & shrimp on a daily basis(she loves it), and then I read the nutrition info on this website that "RES over a year old should be given pellets every other day or two days" and should be fed with vegetables like lettuce.
I tried to feed her green leaf lettuce this morning, and she didn;t show any interest. and then i enticed her with wrapping pellet(or fish) in lettuce and she ate some of it.

My question is that can i feed her vegetable on a daily basis, and pellets and fishes every other day?
and does anyone have any suggestion on how to make my turtle eat vegetable?

Thanks!

Re: Help! How to feed my turtle vegetable?!

PostPosted: Sat Oct 30, 2010 9:02 pm
by blackforces get you
steve recommended this to me and it does work

take the vegtable and dip it in tuna oil. theyll think its tuna and eat it up.

Re: Help! How to feed my turtle vegetable?!

PostPosted: Sat Oct 30, 2010 9:03 pm
by meltedspork
You shouldn't generally feed that much protein (fish, shrimp) on a daily basis... that should be only an occasional treat. You should feed pellets (the amount should be the size of your turtle's head) every other day and feed veggies (leafy greens like red or green leaf lettuce in particular) daily or at least on the days you don't feed pellets. You should also supplement the diet with calcium - cuttlebone (with the backing removed!) is a great source of it and turtles love to chomp on it. To get your turtle to eat veggies, have LOTS of patience, try different types (my guy only likes red leaf lettuce), and try soaking the lettuce in tuna juice. If it comes down to it, try the "turtle jello shots" recipe which you can find as a sticky in this section of the forum.

Re: Help! How to feed my turtle vegetable?!

PostPosted: Sat Oct 30, 2010 11:24 pm
by Dodoturtle
yeah, i know the nutrition thing now, and I am trying to change her diet.
Thanks for all the suggestions, I will try to soak vegatable in tuna!!

Re: Help! How to feed my turtle vegetable?!

PostPosted: Mon Nov 01, 2010 5:02 pm
by marisa
Not tuna oil---it would be better to use the water that tuna is packed in.

Re: Help! How to feed my turtle vegetable?!

PostPosted: Wed Nov 17, 2010 3:25 pm
by za94
i've tried dipping vegetables in chicken stock, that kind of works, but i'm still having the same problems. They try it but then they just wont take to it afterwards. Does anyone have anymore suggestions? Oh btw good tip, for some reason my turtle doesnt like fresh apple but likes it dried like the apple you get in cereal.

Re: Help! How to feed my turtle vegetable?!

PostPosted: Sat Nov 20, 2010 5:47 pm
by steve
Get a veggie clip from the aquarium section... it holds the leaves in place.

Re: Help! How to feed my turtle vegetable?!

PostPosted: Sun Oct 05, 2014 11:18 pm
by Frosty Liu
I have tried to trick. My baby res so eat them after I wrapped them in pellets. Nope, not eating them. d:

Re: Help! How to feed my turtle vegetable?!

PostPosted: Mon Oct 06, 2014 10:00 am
by steve
Turtles are smarter than we think :)

Re: Help! How to feed my turtle vegetable?!

PostPosted: Tue Oct 07, 2014 1:58 pm
by TravisL
Buy bag clips from dollars store and Velcro dots from the dollar store and voila veggy clip.
Most turtles won't eat veggies till prob after 1 yer old. Mine still doesn't but turtle hellos shots work it's you want to try it. I have about 3 year supply of turtle jello in my freezer. He's won't eat it generally but if I cut into tiny peices he'll grab off turtle platform and usually swallow before he finds out he doesn't like them.

Re: Help! How to feed my turtle vegetable?!

PostPosted: Tue Oct 07, 2014 2:00 pm
by TravisL
Also if you buy bag clips with metal spring make sure you place the clip out of the water and just have the veggies under water so spring doesn't rust. There are non spring bag clips also

Re: Help! How to feed my turtle vegetable?!

PostPosted: Tue Oct 07, 2014 2:42 pm
by steve
A veggie clip is $2 or 3. They have a suction cup and the plastic should be thicker as well.

Re: Help! How to feed my turtle vegetable?!

PostPosted: Thu Oct 09, 2014 8:37 pm
by Frosty Liu
Should I feed my baby RES veggie? If so, I tried to but he/she won't eat it.

Re: Help! How to feed my turtle vegetable?!

PostPosted: Thu Oct 09, 2014 9:41 pm
by Kansasslider
If its just young it doesn't want vegetables now. As they get older they do. Assuming its a Red Eared Slider. Keep offering.

Re: Help! How to feed my turtle vegetable?!

PostPosted: Fri Oct 10, 2014 7:28 am
by Rocky_n_Iggy
To me, it's not worth too much trouble with it. I mean, it's not worth getting all worried about... give it a try, if they don't want to eat veggies after a couple days of trying, feed some pellets. Give it a try again in a week or so. Rinse and repeat.

I may be considered a outcast for saying so, but my turtles have lived on a nothing but pellets for 90% of their life. my oldest is going on 16 years now, and the only time he was ever sick, was when he was about a year old, he had pneumonia then, which I don't believe had anything to do with his diet. For me, you do your best to introduce a variety of foods to your turtles, but then a good pellet diet is also not the worst thing you can do to a turtle.