Pig-nose turtle

[Pedro]

Has any one had experience with the keeping of the pig-nose turtle (carettochelys insculpta)?

Pedro

[Cloudkicker]

Hi Pedro, I personally haven't had experience keeping this species, but I know a fair bit about them and know 3 or 4 people that keep them. I was offered a young one approx. 6 months ago but unfortunately had to turn it down due to lack of space...I'll get em one day though!...If you have some questions about them, don't hesitate to ask.
-Andrew-

[Pedro]

There seems to be differing opinions on the aquarium substrate (i.e. bare glass or sand). Do you have any comment or sources for the floor of the tank?

Pedro

[thunder]

I've never had a turtle of that species, but none of my water turtles have substrate. There really isn't any reason to have it, unless you have plants. It just makes cleaning way difficult.

[Cloudkicker]

Personally I would have gravel because if I'm going to be spending that kind of money on the animal and setup I want it to be a nice display tank. Gravel is much easier to clean than sand and doesn't clog the filter, looks more natural(IMO), and you can still grow plants. Thats just my opinion, you can still keep them without any substrate,but fly rivers are shy turtles so make sure it has plenty of hiding spots to prevent it from stressing. Hope this helps,
-Andrew-

[snoopy]

they are very easy to keep u can just feed them fish food.
here in sing a 3 inch 1 would cost round 20usd.

[Cloudkicker]

Really?, over here they're about 400usd and I'm pretty sure anyone buying something with that kind of price tag (especially a turtle) is already going to know how to keep the animal properly and isn't going to feed them a strict diet of fish food. They have special needs when kept in captivity and if the needs aren't met, most will perish and if some do survive they're horribly unhealthy as adults. If they are kept in poor water conditions, they're very prone to bacterial and fungal infections. If they are raised without proper UV lighting they can develop severe shell problems-as with all other species of turtles. There are so many other things to take into consideration when keeping them. I have read on several occasions that they're farmed out there and unfortunately because so many are produced, wholesalers rely on the pet markets to sell the young ones, therefore they're cheap to buy (ie:20usd) and they are sold with the instruction that there diet consists of just fish food in order to finalize the sale when in fact it consists of mainly vegetation and some animal matter.(I've seen pictures where fly-rivers are packaged into small plastic bags and sold as if they were fish). It irritates me to no end when I see them being sold and treated as disposable animals. It's the same thing around here with sliders (in the states sliders are graded like eggs-grade A;grade B;grade C- and can be sold for as cheap as a 100 lot of sliders for $100-sometimes cheaper depending on their grade-). There's not a whole lot anyone can do about it except educate which is basically the point of this post. Here is a link directly to a more detailed description of what the fly-river(pig-nose) turtle's diet is like, there is also lots of other information on keeping them in captivity: http://www.carettochelys.com/carettochelys/food.htm
Snoopy: if you have one or are planning to get one, I'd strongly recommend reading the above website to get a better idea on how they should be kept. And maybe pass the info along to some people around that area (including the people selling them)...just my opinion.
Sorry for the long post,
-Andrew-

[snoopy]

oh never know that it is so so so ex over yourside.
i do not own 1 i am more into lizards. :medsmile:
to me cheap or ex u still got to give the best care it is still a living thing.

[Cloudkicker]

Right on! what kind of lizards are you into?
-Andrew-

[snoopy]

Chameleon 4 now. use to keep leo, crested, iguana, day gecko, water dragon.......... :mednormal
sad thing is that singapore u can't keep all these exotic pets only can keep dogs, cats, hamster. :medfrown:
there4 exotic pets are very ex here.

[Cloudkicker]

Yeah? I always thought you could own anything you want, I didn't realize there were restrictions on what you can and cannot keep over there. Are there still pet shops that sell exotic animals even though they're not supposed to? If so what kind of uncommon animals have you seen there?
-Andrew-

[snoopy]

nope there no shop selling such pets.
i got all mine from friends.
i have seen things such as albino ball, many types of chameleon but most will die if there is no proper care, lots of different leo, fire skink, different types of king milk and corn snake. there are lots more to name these are the more common 1 seen here.

[snoopy]

not to forget lots of different land tort too esp star tort.

[Cloudkicker]

Nice, what other tortoises have you seen? How much was the albino ball?
Take care,
-Andrew-

[snoopy]

the ball cost something like 4000usd!!!!
most common is star, the rest are less common eg leopard, spider, radiated, pancake, hingeback, greek, sulcata, frostani and some i do not know the name. :)

[Cloudkicker]

Wow, a few rare ones there. Do you recall what the cost on the radiated was?

[snoopy]

the price of the radiated have to see the size and colour of the tort
eg base to tort round 6 inch colour about 50% yellow and black will cost something like 1300 to 1500usd

[The Gawd]

my oppionion on substrate is that while providing a prope environment for the animal, you want to provide the appropiate substrate.... Also benificial micro organisims will live in substrate and help breake down waste, keeping yor tank cleaner loger.... plus if you regularily mantain a cleaning schedual like say gravel vacking once a week, or once every 2 weeks even, whatever fits your schedual will get rid of alot of waste that settels in the substrate..... And if you dont have a substrate any waste or un eaten food will be floating around in your tank clouding it and you will have to phisically take it out.... the idea is to try to recreat an ecosystem..... lasts longer, looks beautifull, animals are happier, plus their not so stressed with ever changing water conditions, ph, ammonia, etc.....

Just My Thoughts

Al :)

P.S. You dont even want to know what keeps my 2 130g turtle tanks clean...... lots of substrate with 25% water changes every 2 weeks, and 2 fluval 403 power heads.... thats it.... However i am building my own sand filters (biological filters) in 5g pails with one of the power heads pushing the water back in to the tank.....