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Originally Posted by JennaPenny  Nope- they were red eared sliders. We took them to the vet. I kinda shortened what happened. We took them for regular, yearly, updates. She was getting calcium deprived, because he'd regularly, um, mount her, and she was at the point where she was actually laying eggs. TOO much, the vet said. Those were her egg shell fragments. At that point, along with her head being chewed up by Bambi, we put her in the herp rescue. I'll get a picture up shortly so you can see that they were definitely red eared sliders. |
Turtles sometimes become aggressive even with each other, separation is a must in such cases. Calcium deprivation can also be diet based. As for the female turtle laying eggs, turtles sometimes lay infertile eggs. Problem for them is turtles can become egg bound(the egg is stuck) if not enough calcium is in their system and can get really ill...
Good that she's in a rescue though, they tend to screen new owners very thorough.
To be honest, I feel it's a really bad idea to buy a child a pet just to teach responsibility, unless of course the parent is willing to pick up the slack and take care of it after "Junior" gets bored... otherwise animal cruelty is bound to occur... Glad that you were well-informed parents who wanted the best in the animals interest as well.
To be honest, the whole child with turtle things is why there's a law in the US that no one shall sell any turtle with a shell length under 4 inches as a pet. Happened because parents long time ago when the turtle islands were a fad started buying them for the kids, the kids being dumb kids would put the turtles in their mouths(why? I don't know kids do plenty of "kid" things) and they would get sick with salmonella and blame it on the turtle rather than the irresponsible parent who taught a kid that an animal is a toy rather than a living being to treat with care and respect. So there passed the law. Don't hate the law though, still doesn't keep turtle out of reach out of irresponsible owners sadly.
Whether it's a dog, or a turtle, a rabbit, a fish or a hermit crab... animals should be treated with our utmost care and respect and should not be used as our tools...