# Baby turtles/Tortoises less than 4"



## fbsmith3 (Oct 2, 2011)

I noticed there are Turtles and tortoises being sold that are less than 4". Is it just the law that Pet stores can not sell animals less than 4" or do they just not regulate private and internet sales.

Just curious.


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## dmmj (Oct 2, 2011)

well the 4 inch law IMHO is stupid, pointless, and wrong, but a business can't sell them under four inches, breeders can.


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## Kristina (Oct 2, 2011)

The law is stupid, but, it does not pertain to hobbyists and breeders, only to pet stores, and is rarely enforced.


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## fbsmith3 (Oct 2, 2011)

I know it's just Uncle Sam, using a sledge hammer to kill a fly. It had something to do with little kids getting Salmonella. 

Since stupid parents see a cute little baby turtle and get it for their their kid and since kids don't wash their hands. Make baby turtles illegal.


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## Kristina (Oct 2, 2011)

It isn't just about the hand-washing. Yes, turtles and torts can carry salmonella, but so does your toothbrush, the dirt in your back yard, dog feces, cat feces, bird droppings, your kitchen counters and computer keyboard, and all kinds of things that you come into contact with on a daily basis. There are over 2,000 strains of salmonella. The chances of getting an infection from a tortoise is very, very VERY slim. As long as you keep your tortoise pen clean and wash your hands after handling your tortoise, there really is nothing to be concerned about.

Back in the 70's there was a trend of selling baby Red Eared slider turtles along with these tiny kidney shaped bowls with a plastic palm tree in it for them to live in. Since sliders can grow to be as big as a dinner plate, the enclosures were way too small, and also they were unfiltered, and therefore too dirty to keep the turtles healthy. Because the water was so dirty and the turtles were unhealthy, the situation caused the turtle's immune system to weaken and allowed the salmonella bacteria in the turtle's intestine to multiply like crazy. Because the intestine would become overloaded with the bacteria, they would shed high concentrations of the bacteria in their feces, which then entered the already dirty water. Inevitably, small children would put their hands or the sick little turtle in their mouth, and get a salmonella infection. It caused a pretty big stereotype about turtles and tortoises carrying salmonella and making people sick, and led to the outlawing of sales of turtles/tortoises under 4" as pets. As long as you practice good hygiene and take good care of your pet, there should not be any problems.

Read more: http://www.tortoiseforum.org/Thread-Do-tortoises-carry-salmonella-answer-inside#ixzz1ZfisTXpo


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## dmmj (Oct 2, 2011)

they thought kids would put the turtles in their mouths and get salmonella, well they thought 4 inches was to big to fit into a child's mouth, but as anyone with a child and half an IQ point (which excuses most politicians) knows that kids will touch the turtle not wash their hands and then put their hands in their mouth, I honestly don't know of any child that actually put turtles into their mouths, but hey the government says so so it must be true ( sarcasm for those without my patented sarcasm detector)


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## fbsmith3 (Oct 2, 2011)

Have you read "Tales of a Four Grade Nothing" Fudge the baby brother ate the main characters turtle.

Just something that poped into my head. 

This is how the government works, find a problem, do not fix it just screw it up with some kind of feel good regulations.

When I read that book in fourth grade, I cried so hard, I had a pond in my back yard with Eastern Painted turtles, Spotted turtles and the occasional Box turtle. They were all wild not pets, but I considered them my friends. So when I read that fudge ate "dribble(?)", it really effected me, the teacher never understood.


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## Kristina (Oct 2, 2011)

Yes, I have read that book


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## dmmj (Oct 2, 2011)

fudge and super fudge


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## fbsmith3 (Oct 2, 2011)

I grew up on a farm and we had a huge manure pile that ever so often had to be spread out. When we moved the manure, we'd find turtle eggs. I would collect the turtle eggs and put them in a safe location so no wild animals could get them. Then I would return every day to see if they hatched. A lot of the eggs hatched and my mother would warn me about gettign sick fromt he turtles. I never did, of course I live on a farm and washing up was very important or you'd be eating some type of animals poo.


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## dmmj (Oct 2, 2011)

fbsmith3 said:


> I grew up on a farm and we had a huge manure pile that ever so often had to be spread out. When we moved the manure, we'd find turtle eggs. I would collect the turtle eggs and put them in a safe location so no wild animals could get them. Then I would return every day to see if they hatched. A lot of the eggs hatched and my mother would warn me about gettign sick fromt he turtles. I never did, of course I live on a farm and washing up was very important or you'd be eating some type of animals poo.


What type were they?
And I know of a lot of people here in calif that find babies crawling out of manure piles.


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## fbsmith3 (Oct 2, 2011)

*RE: Baby turtles/Tortoises less than 4"*

We had a lot of paint turtle babies, a few spotted turtles and seldomly box turtle babies. Now spotted turtles are extremely rare and box turtles are impossible to find.

My mother says the pond only has paint turtles and a couple of snapping turtles. She had the snapping turtles moved, but they kept coming back. She wanted to kill them, until I told her they keep even bigger snapping turtles away.

As a kid I used to ride a huge snapping turtle, Olde Gruppy, around the pond. He never bit and put up with a lot from me. I used to feed him left-over chicken. Olde Gruppy had a healed over crack on the left front part of his shell. I only "socialized" with him. Olde Gruppy dissappeared around 1990. The current snapping turtles moved in some time in the last 5 years.

If my son did some of the stuff I did as a child, I would be extremly upset.

Now that I think of it, Grumpy was probally eating the baby turtles I was trying to protect. As a kid I never knew turtles eat turtles.

That is just terrible.


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## Kristina (Oct 3, 2011)

Eh, it is nature, unfortunately. 

The turtles lay the eggs in the manure piles because as the cellulose composts, it generates heat. Makes a nice incubator, lol.


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## mer001 (Oct 3, 2011)

fbsmith3 said:


> I noticed there are Turtles and tortoises being sold that are less than 4". Is it just the law that Pet stores can not sell animals less than 4" or do they just not regulate private and internet sales.
> 
> Just curious.



I recently adopted a redfoot from a woman who bought him from a pet store, and he is only 3 in by 2.5in

i dont think it is ever enforced.


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## DesertGrandma (Oct 3, 2011)

When I was a child they sold tiny turtles that were painted all over their shells with bright colored paints. Flowers and such. Pretty much like you get your fingernails polished with bright enamels. Kids bought them like crazy. They were about the size of a silver dollar (if anyone remembers them, haha). The turtles always died. It was eventually made illegal to sell painted turtles because the paint was said to suffocate them.


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## fbsmith3 (Oct 3, 2011)

Well the painted turtles I know, were paited by nature/God. They have red, yellow and orange stripes on their skin and the edge of their shell has beautiful patterns.


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## John (Oct 4, 2011)

mer001 said:


> fbsmith3 said:
> 
> 
> > I noticed there are Turtles and tortoises being sold that are less than 4". Is it just the law that Pet stores can not sell animals less than 4" or do they just not regulate private and internet sales.
> ...


The "four inch rule" is enforced. The sad part is, that the punishment is to kill the animals. So if a pet store is selling 3.5 inch tortoises and gets caught they can recieve a small fine and have ten days to destroy the animals in the presence of a federal game officer, not sure who the winner is supposed to be here.........I know who the losers are though.


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## fbsmith3 (Oct 4, 2011)

That is awful, now I see why some do not want to enforce it. Those who do enforce it, are probally sadistic.


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## Camelot (Oct 6, 2011)

*RE: Baby turtles/Tortoises less than 4"*



fbsmith3 said:


> and box turtles are impossible to find.




Not here in Oklahoma! There's not a day that went by this summer that people weren't swerving all over the country roads to avoid hitting one that was basking in the MIDDLE of the road, unfazed!


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## RoseRose (Oct 6, 2011)

That's terrible that the enforcement is to kill the babies!! How cruel. 

My local reptile pet store has baby tortoises. Lots of sulcatas and a couple of leopards. They're all 2.5" or less. They also have a red foot juvenile that the woman working there said had been there since it was a hatchling.

~Rose


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## flyingsqueak (Oct 6, 2011)

I do see a huge problem with people selling turtles and tortoises under 4 inches--reputable breeders to hobbyists, fine, but not in stores.

Why? Because people see these tiny little turtles sold for a couple of bucks and assume that they'll never grow, and most of the people who sell them that small in shops are more interested in making money than in ensuring that the animals receive adequate care.

I work at a chain pet store (yes, I don't like them either, but it's the only place that would hire me in this economy). Every day we have multiple people come in who have just purchased tiny red eared sliders--usually from China town, but occasionally from breeders online. They always, without fail, regardless of where they got them, believe that the turtles will not grow and will require $5 to $20 worth of supplies to properly take care of them. This is seriously twenty-five people a week in one pet store, that's approximately sixty-five turtles each week. How many pet stores are there nation wide?

I take the time to gently explain to them the truth of the situation, that these little turtles could grow up to thirteen inches, that they need a basking bulb and a UVB bulb, that without proper heat the food will literally rot in their guts and can lead to death, that the little pellet food is really not good and they'll need a varied diet, that the absolute minimum housing required is a forty gallon aquarium, etc. Without fail, 9 times out of 10, they'll still walk out with nothing more than a 10 gallon and some pellets, maybe a floating platform. Some claim that they'll get better set ups for them within a few months, others are in complete denial and believe that I'm lieing to them in order to trick them in to spending money.

I know a large part of this is personal responsibility, that you should never buy a pet before researching their care. But that's why I'm still okay with them being available through reputable breeders--less chance of impulse buys if you don't see them while picking up dog food or acting the tourist in China Town. 

Think about it though, imagine that you have never seen an adult mastiff, you walk into a shop in China Town and there are twenty or thirty little dogs in boxes. How cute! Dogs are so small and can stay in boxes, they must not require much to take care of, and anyways, there's no way something that small and cheap can live more than a year (they're only $5 and you are kind of familiar with hamsters). Would you believe it when someone tells you that these tiny dogs are really just puppies and will grow to be well over 100lbs? Remember you've never seen an adult mastiff or any other adult dog (except maybe once in a zoo, but that had to be some bizarre and exotic specimen).

I'm all for the individual's rights and responsible pet ownership, but when these tiny turtles are available for almost nothing in random shops where people see them living in horrible conditions it creates nothing other than unwittingly abusive owners. I really wish this law was enforced more thoroughly (though not by culling the babies).


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## fbsmith3 (Oct 6, 2011)

Honestly that is how I got 2 of my parrots, a few iguanas, my box turtle and a few fish. I was lucky to know people who would take care of them better. So I gave them the iguanas and the fish. It amazes me that people buy baby animals with no expectation of their adult size.

The comparison of puppies to dogs is genius and I wish I thought of it when I worked the evil pet trade. I got fired from one store because after 2 years my sales were the highest at that location, but I sold no puppies. I told them "let someone else sell your parvo puppy mill dogs, I'm not doing it." I was hired the next day by a rival pet store who didn't sell dogs. I lasted another 2 years with them before I gor sick of the whole pet trade.

Your doing good work at the pet shop, keep up the fight. Every proper set up you sell is another animals saved, thanks.


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## TragicQuietus (Oct 19, 2011)

I don't know how the laws work everywhere but I work in a pet store chain in Canada. If the breeders ship us undersized torts (or any animal for that matter) we "refuse" them. They get listed as "too small, weak, or sick, and not received" As unsellable animals they are raised in store and when safe, adopted out. No money made, but at least they can find good homes and not have to go through the stress of being shipped again. My girl is just under 2 inches, I adopted her a few months ago.


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## Madkins007 (Oct 19, 2011)

While I wish there was a better solution, destroying the 'contriband' animals (a typical part of many illegal animal enforcement rules) DOES tend to remove the incentive to just bring in more. Giving the animals to someone actually makes things worse because you need some tool to regulate who can get them, etc.

The original bill had a lot of things behind it- Salmonella, loss of wild populations, incredibly high death rate of baby turtles, etc. I for one would hate to go back to the days of baby turtles in death bowls. There is also the issue about the spread of Red-ears as an invasive species and the loss of natives because of the pet trade.


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