I have small red-eared sliders and how should i take care of them?

i want to take better care and learn some new things. what should i give them and how should they be care? thanks

I have small red-eared sliders and how should i take care of them?
Here's my basic care guide for RES. I hope it's helpful!


TANK





You will need a tank that allows for 10 gallons of water per square inch of shell. For instance, a 5" turtle will need about a 55 gallon aquarium. There's enough room to swim and then a little so that they can come all the way out of the water to bask. You will need to invest in either a filter specifically made for aquatic turtles or a fish filter that can do twice the amount of water in the tank. For instance, if you have a 50 gallon tank, the fish filter must say it's able to handle 100 gallons of water. This is because turtles are way more messy than fish. You'll need to replace the filter at least once a week, more if necessary. You'll need to line to bottom of the tank with river rocks. These work best because small pebbles are easily swallowed by turtles but extremely hard to digest and can result in digestive problems. They will need to have a landing made out of river rocks on one side of their tank (mine is the width of the tank) that allows them to come completely out of water to bask. It needs to be wide enough and long enough for your turtle.





LIGHTING





Your turtle needs both UVB and UVA lighting. The UVB prevents metabolic bone disease, synthesizes calcium, and produces and synthesizes vitamin D3. This light aso helps with digestion. In a 55 gallon tank, a 5.0 UVB light will do the trick. When you get to larger tanks, you'll need a bigger light like a 10.0. You'll need a basking light. These produce UVA so these take care of 2 duties at once. They provide your turtle with the UVA it needs and heats their basking spot and tank. I recomend a 75 watt bulb to 100 watt bulb.





HEATING





Their water needs to always be between 75 and 80 degreese Farenheight. Their basking area needs to be between 85 and 95 degreese F. Any hotter, and you'll burn the turtle. Any colder and it will freeze. Turtles can't produce their own heat so the temperature around them helps them regulate body temps. At night, it's ok for the temperature gets to 60 degreese F but never any lower. Their UVA/heat lamp should be placed over their basking area. My heat lamp heats both the basking area and water but sometimes it's not this lucky. If the temperatures fail to reach these temperatures, you'll want to invest in a water heater. You'll also want a water themometer placed in the water area of their tank and a land thermometer placed near their basking spot to regulate temperature.





DIET


Turtles need a balanced diet. 50% feeder fish (minnows, goldfish, rosy reds, etc, I've fed mine these and tetras, zeebra fish, scissortails, and small stuff like that) snails, crickets, grasshoppers, krill, and baby shrimp, 25% a good pelet food like ZooMed's or T-Rex (my preferance on this is ZooMed's because the T-Rex float to the bottom and make a huge mess in the tank) but brands like Wardley's and ReptoMin suffice if they have to, and finally 25% greens like mustard, collard greens, and other dark leafy greens. They don't need to have greens until they are over 4" in diameter and they don't need feeder fish until then too. Sometimes turtles lack calcium (which if they have the proper diet should not but it happens) or they have over-active jaws. An easy and inexpensive way to cure this is with a calcium bone (also called turtle bones) that float. This is always avalible and mine nibbles on it occasionally. You really don't need supplements for vitamins if you provide them with the proper habitat. It is a hard job to supplement them with the vitamins and such that they recieve in their diet and from their UV lighting.





CLEANING THE TANK





You'll probably have to clean the tank once a week if not more. I find that this is easily done with a water syphon. You can get these sepcially made for aqariums that both drain and fill the tanks. You'll want to have a back up tank or tub to put your turtle in while doing a tank cleaning. You'll also want to put any feeder fish in this too. The rocks really just need a good rinse but to really get the tank clean you have to take them out. I spray the tank with ZooMed's Wipe Out and it helps kill and prevent salmonilla, which is very common in reptiles. You could simply use anti-bacterial and animal safe soap, like Dawn, to clean the tank also.





MAINTANING A CLEAN TANK





This is really not as hard as it sounds as long as you change the filter properly. You can also use snails (sucker fish aren't really recomended as the turtle may eat them) which the turtle may eat but are really inexpensive and really good for the tank. You can also add a plant called Anacharis which eats the turtle feces, looks good in the tank, is an oxygenizer, and the turtle may eat it. You can also add water conditioner like ZooMed's Repti-Safe which reduces pH, adds electrolites, helps ammonia build up, and a big list of good stuff. To help control disease, you can also use a turtle health conditioner (TetraFauna makes a really good one). You can also add Exo-Terra's Biotize to the tank to help eat the turtle feces but is pretty uncesseary. For new arivals you may want to add something that adds electrolites as it is kinda tramatizing when they're moved around a lot and good for new arrivals. A good thing for this, I've found, is Exo-Terra's Electrodize. If you want to get really paranoid you can always use pH strips too to make sure the water is perfect for them.
Reply:Here is some information how you can take care of SMALL ones :)





Well, red eared sliders need a diet that is a mixture of animal and plant material. However, young red eared sliders eat more animal protein so babies are started off on a diet that is more on the carnivorous side. It is still a good idea to offer vegetation to young turtles although they may not really start eating it until they get older (offering it early on at least makes it less likely they will shy away from trying it as they age). For adult red eared sliders, vegetation should make up a significant part of the diet.





And here is Items to Feed Red Eared Sliders :)





Feeder Items: live feeder fish (guppies, goldfish, minnows), earthworms, crickets, waxworms, earthworms, silkworms, aquatic snails, blood worms, daphnia, shrimp, krill, mealworms. For very small turtles, prey may have to be cut into smaller pieces. Larger turtles can be offered larger items like tadpoles.


Leafy greens: collard, mustard and dandelion greens, kale, bok choy. Head (iceberg) lettuce should never be feed as it contains very little nutrition, but dark green leaf lettuces (e.g romaine) can be feed sparingly


Aquatic plants: in an aquarium or pond you can add aquatic plants on which turtles usually love to snack. Submerged plants like anacharis are often eaten, as are water hyacinth, water lettuce, duckweed, azolla (fairy moss), and frog-bit.


Other vegetables: carrots (tops are fine too), squash and green beans.





And also, of course Supplements


A good reptile multivitamin with calcium and vitamin D3 shoule be mixed with the food a couple of times a week. Also, an excellent way to provide additional calcium is by putting a cuttlebone in the turtle tank. These are often avaiable in the bird section, and they can be affixed to the tank or just floated in the water.





And here are some photos of a red-eared slider, check it out :)
Reply:well first things first get a book on them out of the libary. that'll help u alot and it'll give u more answer' then any answer here
Reply:They need a place to rest above the water. They are not fish. They will eat minnows or fish food. They will eat larger fish as they get older and will become trouble in a fish tank or pond. You can buy food for them at the store.
Reply:well actualy they need a really realy big tank i think it is about 75 gallons to achieve "proper" size. if you feed them pellets make shure they are fortified with calcium and try giving them some earthworms and crickets. they need a basking light if they do not have access to natural sunlight, for they need the sunlight to digest properly and so their shell remains stiff and strong.
Reply:Here is a website that should help you a little ( i know it's a little long):








http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=h...



maintenance repairs