Help Me Decide - Please

[MonsterFish]

I plan to buy a specimen fish/turtle to house in a 6' tank before moving it into a tropical pond, can any body offer me advise or personal opinions? What would you keep? I was thinking snapping turtle or red tailed cat hence they are the choices of the poll but I am open to suggestions

 

[tamara]

in my personal opinion i'd go for the turtle..but make sure you look him up and everything..
because i have no clue what they need and all..
but i've always had fish so i'm almost tierd of them..and always wanted a mud turtle..
but they're like..100$ at my lfs so ya..that's why i'd go for the fish if you can care for them..
look both up though and see which one suits you best!

 

[fish-r-fancy]

I voted other. I think you shoul go with a red eared alider turtle because snapping turtles get HUGE also the snapping turtle would probably eat anything you put in a pond!

 

[Griz]

Both choices will eat anything else you put in there and both will also require a huge pond. Snappers tend to move around from place to place and may not be content to stay put in your pond. Feeding will also be a challenge in both cases.

 

[n3ont3tra]

I caught a 1 inch snapper and I've kept him in my 45g for about ... 5 months now. He's really cute, he always goes down to the bottom and goes through the little castle thing. He's in a tank with a 5 inch painted turtle and a few 4 inch channel cats and a 4 inch sunfish and nothing /ever/ bothers him. He just goes u p and tanks the turtle pellets with the Painted turtle and when they get worms, he grabs one and when the channel cat gets it he hangs on for a 5 minute ride around the tank.

 

[MonsterFish]

Thanks for the help guys, I have researched both and I know that they both get huge and dont really tolerate tankmates.

n3ont3tra I thought you couldnt keep them with anything, what size is he now then??

 

[n3ont3tra]

He's was only one inch when I caught him and now he's about an inch and a half. But once they get big, like over 4 inches, you can't keep them with anything. When I first got him I had him in a 10g with a few guppies, and he'd try to get one while they wer sleeping. I think the only fish he ever got were the babies, because I never found any after I put him in. He chased the other guppies around during the daytime, he almost got a few then, too. Now he's in the 45 gallon, and he's the smallest thing in the tank.

 

[MonsterFish]

cool, I'm definatly interested in getting one, there awesome when their small, thought has to be given though to when they turn into this. . .

 

[n3ont3tra]

I think you could lose more than a finger with a mistake from one of those dudes! More like a hand!

 

[tophat665]

cool, I'm definatly interested in getting one, there awesome when their small, thought has to be given though to when they turn into this. . .

UFIA!

There were some monster snappers in the lake I grew up by - big enough that you had to look close to see if it was a muskrat or a turtle head poking out of the water. They never bothered me or anyone that I know of, but Dad says he accidently caught one when he was in high school, and Grammy made soup and served it in it's shell.

There were also a couple of big snappers in the pond last place I worked (one dinner plate sized, one serving tray sized) who would come up and eat pieces of bagel thrown into the water for them

 

[woogrl]

I definatly vote other because both the red tail cat and the snapper are going to get way to big for any kind of pond that you would have, plus they would eat anything and everything they were kept with. If you want turtles go with some type of slider turtles but make sure they are not illegal in the place where you live.

 

[x-fish]

the red tail cat is awesome
and so are seaturtles but it think ud be better of getting the red tail cat

 

[CFC]

How big is the pond going to be?

An adult redtail is going to need an area of 16 feet long and 8 feet wide by 4 feet high as a minimum, thats a lot of space to have in a building and a lot of water to heat. A lot of serious thought needs to take place before deciding to keep animals which grow to the size and body mass of fish like these.

 

[MonsterFish]

Sorry I havnt been on in a while, the pond is already built, its indoors and was used by my father to house koi in the past but I want something a bit different. The dimensions are 19ft x 12ft x 4ft, plenty big enough I think!

Yeah the running costs when heating is added could be a problem but I think I can budget for it.

PS Havnt got either for the tank yet so still open to suggestions, been concentrating on my miny setups of Neolamprologus Multifasciatus and Prehistoric Monster Fish in the mean time

 

[insanityseeker]

big pond...