How to Care for Yellow Belly Turtles

 

Yellow belly turtles are one of the best turtles to keep as a pet. They are good-looking and an easy turtle to care for in a home aquarium. The most popular is known as a yellow-bellied slider and he gets that name from sliding into the water from his basking site. These turtles love to bask and need a nice rock or other basking spot.

When you prepare to bring home a pet turtle make sure that you have all of the equipment you need and that it is set up properly. Always know what size the turtle you are purchasing will be as an adult and have a large enough tank to accommodate his size.

When you buy yellow belly turtles, they will often not be larger than a half dollar but in two years they can grow to be as much as ten to twelve inches across. A yellow-bellied slider can live to be as old as 40 years. They are native to the southeastern portion of the United States.

What do these turtles look like?

As you might expect, yellow belly turtles do indeed have yellow bellies. This is true from hatchling to adult sizes. The top of their shells are green with dark lines. Although their heads are green as well, the yellow belly has a yellow patch on the cheek.

What do they do during the day?

If any reptile has the perfect life, it must be a yellow belly turtle. Their only goal every day is to eat and to maintain a proper body temperature. They must have a heat lamp if you are keeping the turtles in an inside tank. They like to bask on rocks or other objects until they are warm enough, then they slide into the water to cool off. This cycle goes on throughout the day as they continually try to maintain a body temperature that goes up and down by fifteen to twenty degrees.

Yellow belly turtles are good swimmers. They like to stay in the water for long periods and they can sleep there for thirty to forty minutes at a time. These turtles eat while they are in the water. You can have a couple of babies in a fifteen-gallon aquarium but your will have to upsize by the time they are adults. Two adult turtles will need a tank in the 75 to 100-gallon range.

Habitat

The yellow-bellied slider needs at least a foot and a half of water in the tank. He should be able to turn over within the water. The water needs to be warm as well--in the 72 to 85 degree range. You must provide a basking area so your turtle can crawl out of the water and bask in the heated part of the tank. The area needs to be large enough that the turtle can dry out and the temperature in this space needs to be between 95 and 102 degrees.

Feeding

Yellow bellied turtles are omnivorous, which means they eat both meat and plants. The baby turtles will search for insects and even eat bits of dead fish. They will also eat plants but by the time yellow bellies are adults, around 95% of their food will come from plants. You can get pond plants at your pet shop. You can also feed greens like lettuce freely each day. You should also get some pelleted fish food for them, such as catfish chow or pelleted trout food. Don’t feed them frozen meat but fresh minnows, worms and insects are excellent treats. Uneaten foods should be removed in 24 hours.

Although you may want to hold your yellow-bellied slider, be careful as some will get used to being handled and some will bite. Overall, however, these yellow belly turtles make wonderful pets and are fascinating to watch.