Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

LENNY FLANK JR., has kept more than 100 different species of reptiles over the past twenty-five years. He is the author of five books on reptiles, amphibians, and invertebrates, and has written articles for Reptiles Magazine and Reptile and Amphibian Hobbyist magazine.

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The authoritative information and advice you need, illustrated throughout with full-color photographs?now revised and redesigned to be even more reader-friendly!

With their interesting shells and slow, deliberate demeanors, turtles are intriguing creatures. The more you know about turtles, the more fascinated you'll be as you watch your pet enjoy life in the slow lane. With colorful photos, charts, and tables, this guide covers the basics, including:

• Choosing your turtle?terrestrial or aquatic

• Setting up a tank with the right environment

• Essential equipment and supplies

• Maintaining the proper temperature, lighting, and humidity

• Feeding and caring for your turtle

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Turtle: Your Happy Healthy Pet

John Wiley & Sons

Chapter One

There is perhaps no more easily recognizable animal on earth than a turtle. Although there are lizards who look like snakes and salamanders who look like lizards, no other living creature looks remotely like a turtle. With their calm dispositions and brightly colored shells, turtles have been spared the enmity with which most other reptiles are usually regarded. Unlike lizards and snakes, which are almost universally reviled, turtles are usually considered charming and attractive creatures. Few people, even the most intense reptile haters, are afraid of turtles.

A few decades ago, every convenience store in the country was stocked with tiny, bright green baby turtles, usually found in a shallow water tray complete with a tiny plastic island and a palm tree. Unfortunately, few of the many thousands of people who purchased these little creatures had any real idea how to care for them, and most of them ended up in a watery grave after a few months. This dreadful mortality rate, combined with some exaggerated fears about the spread of disease by turtles, virtually put an end to the turtle pet trade.

Today, however, we have become more knowledgeable about the natural world and the role that various animals play in it-including reptiles-and turtles have once again become popular pets.

This book was written as a guide for the beginning turtle keeper, so new hobbyists can keep their pets happy and healthy. Although keeping turtles and tortoises in captivity is not difficult, there are a few potential problems that turtle keepers must be aware of, and a few rules and procedures that must be followed if these animals are to thrive in captivity.

Our knowledge of how to meet the needs of captive reptiles has expanded enormously in the past few years, and even though this book is aimed primarily at beginners, I hope that it can serve as a useful reference for more experienced turtle keepers, as well.

The Biology of Turtles and Tortoises

There are about 220 species of turtles living today-less than one-tenth the number of living snakes or lizards. Despite their relative lack of diversity, however, turtles are hardy and adaptable animals, and have moved into a wide variety of habitats, from hot, arid deserts to the open seas.

In size, they range from the tiny Musk turtle, less than 5 inches long, to the huge marine Leatherback, which reaches lengths of over 6 feet and weighs more than half a ton. The largest living land turtle, the Galapagos tortoise, can reach a length of 41/2 feet and weigh more than 550 pounds.

All turtles are reptiles, a class of animals characterized by dry scaly skin, a dependence upon external heat sources rather than internal metabolism, and a shelled egg that can be laid on land.

Ectothermic Animals

Like all other reptiles and amphibians, turtles are ectothermic, meaning they cannot produce their own internal body heat. Such a system of metabolism is sometimes called "cold-blooded," but this is not a very accurate term, since some desert tortoises maintain a body temperature of more than 100 degrees Fahrenheit.

The word ectothermic comes from the Latin words for "outside heat," and this is a better description of how the turtle's metabolism functions. In all animals, including reptiles, biological processes are controlled by a class of chemicals known as enzymes, and these enzymes work best at rather high temperatures. In "warm-blooded" animals, such as mammals, the heat that is released during metabolism is used to warm the body and maintain the proper temperature for these enzymes, no matter what the environmental temperature might be. A human being, for instance, maintains a body temperature of close to 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit, whether the air temperature is 100 degrees or 50 degrees.

Ectotherms, however, cannot produce enough body heat from their own metabolism to maintain their body temperature at a specific level. Therefore, they would take on the same body temperature as their surroundings. To prevent this, and to maintain a suitable body temperature, reptiles must use external sources of heat to keep their internal temperature high enough. That is why turtles are most often seen basking on logs or rocks in the sun; they are using the heat provided by the sun to raise their body temperature to an acceptable level.

This need to maintain and conserve body heat is one of the most important factors in any turtle's life. In hot environments, such as Latin American and African deserts, it is easy for the turtle to maintain a high body temperature; therefore, semiarid and desert areas have a wide variety of turtles.

Because water can retain heat more effectively than air, aquatic habitats in warm areas also provide the all-important external heat needed by turtles. The largest living turtles are entirely aquatic, and live either in warm, shallow rivers and lakes or in the open seas. Here the ambient temperature is so high that the turtle can afford to develop a large, heavy body-something that would take an unacceptably long time to heat up in cooler areas.

In fact, the large sea turtles, such as Leatherbacks, have such large bodies that they can retain more body heat (which is continuously produced by the action of their swimming muscles) than they lose through their body surface. This enables them to maintain body temperatures that are several degrees higher than the surrounding ocean water.

In cooler, temperate regions, such as North America and Europe, it is more difficult for turtles to stay warm. As a result, turtles from cooler areas are typically smaller and darker in color than tropical turtles (so they can absorb sunlight and heat themselves up faster). In the winter, when short days and colder temperatures make it impossible to maintain the best body temperature, turtles will bury themselves deep in the mud, below the frost line, and hibernate, slowing down virtually all of their body functions. These turtles emerge in the spring when the days grow longer and the temperatures get warmer.

Chelonian Anatomy

The most obvious characteristic of turtles is, of course, the shell. It varies from the leathery carapace of the Softshell turtle, which contains hardly any bone at all, to the thick casing of the Box turtle, which can make up to one-third of the animal's total body weight. The shell is made from bony plates in the skin that have fused to the rib cage. The internal anatomy of the turtle, particularly the breathing apparatus and the pelvis and shoulder bones (also called the limb girdles), have been heavily modified to accommodate the shell.

The Eyes

Turtles have excellent vision and can detect motion at a considerable distance. They can also detect the outlines of potential predators, even if the intruder is not moving. Along with their keen sense of smell, turtles use their eyesight as the primary way of finding food. According to most scientists, turtles are able to see in color, and are particularly sensitive to reds and yellows (they can also sense a range of infrared wavelengths that are invisible to humans).

Turtle eyes have two large tear ducts (called lachrymal glands), and in some turtles-particularly the marine turtles, who ingest large quantities of salt water with their food-these lachrymal glands are used to excrete excess salt from the body in the form...