I have a 5.5" female red eared slider who still won't eat plant matter. Everything I've read says she should be, but she'll only take pellets and live feeders. Any ideas. A few shots of her are below:
RES Question
- Thread starter snappyguy
- Start date
She looks nice and healthy. What types of plants are you feeding her? You can put some live water lettuce, horwort and anacharis in the tank. Then she can nibble on it when she feels like it. Some plants you can try feeding would be kale, mustard greens and chopped zucchini. I would avoid the feeders as they are pretty much junk food for turtles. Some other foods you can try instead are earthworms, crickets, freeze-dried shrimp, algae waffers, and thawed shrimp.
Never tried algae wafers. It might be a good bridge between what she's had and what she should be eating. She never much cared for anacharis or lettuce of any kind, but I'll try some hornwort and zucchini. Crickets are big on her list of favorites.
Have you tried leaving the greens in her tank for a couple days (switching the old ones for new every day, but having a constant supply) without giving her anything else? Mine didn't take to greens at first either, but on the second day without pellets I noticed a couple bites out of her greens, day after that they were gone.
I'll try that. Maybe she's just taking what she's used to and knows is safe. I'm almost sure she is know that I think of it because she prefers pellets over stick shaped food. The breeder must have been a pellet only type person.
Giving anacharis another try. Got 5 bunches for the price of 1 at an LFS. Also picked up some hornwort. Hopefully she'll take to these and the plants will keep growing in her tank and my FW display.
I imagine that hornwort will be in there long enough to grow a good bit. It took mine much longer to figure out that stuff was edible even after she got to where she prefers plants over pellets.
Mine eat cabbage, cukes, zucchini, carrots whatever I put in. they get pellets and krill as well. i have never fed anything living. They are quite fond of duckweed as well.
You can try alternating pellets and veggies. One day feed veggies, next pellets. When they are younger they eat more meaty foods as they get older she might take to veggies more. You also feed krill as well. Good Idea with the algae wafers Vicious.
Now that's the one thing mine refused to eat no matter what. She absolutely hates it. And I've never heard of any other RES's that react that way to duckweed, just mine. :headshake2: