Counting turtles....

[Marshall]

If you decide to have pond turtles then you will want to have some sort of plastic tub or box to count them. Why would you count the turtles if you know how many you put in? because they do sometimes fall victim to a predator or simply get out the pond and leave. If you try counting them in the pond with 3 or more then unless you see them all at once don't be so sure in your count. They like to stay spread out from each other and move at seperate times so you may end up counting the same one twice. I tested this theory once and ended up with a tally of 31 turtles in my pond lol but only have 3. Just catch them put them in the tub and count because if one did get out the quicker you realize this the better chance you have of tracking him down and putting him back in the pond.

 

[addy1]

Like counting fish.........good luck

 

[Marshall]

Like counting fish.........good luck

I know thats right. I tried counting my koi and goldfish once and have not tried it since

 

[brokensword]

I can actually get a pretty good count (of the fish; turtles are a bit harder but if they're trained to feed the same time as the fish, I can typically find all I have); I simply feed them and while they all have their mouths full, trying to squash the pellet, they always stop swimming. And as long as I can see to the bottom, and count fast, I'm not off by much!

YMMV


Michael

 

[Mmathis]

I started out with 8 box turtle hatchlings. As they've gotten older, they have developed their own characteristics, but when babies they were hard to tell apart. I started out with acrylic paints and assigned each one a color, then painted a circle on the top of each shell [which is called the carapace]. I haven't renewed the paint in a while because there are still traces of the original paint. It works for boxies, but don't know how it would work for water turtles. Plus, I only have 7 turts [#8 disappeared a few years ago], so a lot easier to keep up with -- when they want to be found, that is. I love my turtles!

And for counting my fish -- I take a picture at feeding time, then count & number them, LOL! Last time I did that [a few months ago] I counted 48 gold fish!