New hatchlings...help me take good care of them please

[gardenjewel]

Hello all,
A few months ago I rescued 6 box turtle eggs from fire ants right after mom laid them. I now have 4 live hatchlings. It has been about 12 days. 2 of those did not look so good at first but are improving. They were very slow absorbing their yolks, while the other two yolks are already gone. What I am concerned about is getting them to eat. After reading a little on the forums I changed their habitat and warmed it up a bit and finally the first hatched got up and explored. So I feel we made progress ! I have tiny mealworms, crushed turtle pellets, and greens in their enclosure. What else can I do to help them along, and make sure they are eating? They seem to have no interest in food.
They are in a plastic tub with about a half an inch of forest floor substrate. The have a terra cotta pool and food plate. They have 2 hides and a uv lamp. I am keeping it nice and humid and the temperature in the room is around 82 in the day time and around 79 at night. Two of them are in this enclosure and the other two are still in a brooding box.
Thanks!

 

[Tom]

This might help:
http://www.tortoiseforum.org/threads/how-to-incubate-eggs-and-start-hatchlings.124266/

 

[gardenjewel]

Thanks for answering!! I have followed in instructions in that link which helped greatly. Except about giving them food in the brooding box....to late for that! I am just wondering what I should be doing to get these babies to eat?

 

[Tom]

I'm no box turtle expert, but I've kept a few of them. When they are little they have highly insectivorous tendencies. Have you tried any bugs or earthworms?
Get a small cricket or roach and squash its head between your thumb and forefinger nails. Then drop it a couple inches in front of the baby. The wiggling and scooting about often entices them to pounce.

 

[johnsonnboswell]

Hatchlings and young'uns are largely carnivorous. Live wriggling food attracts them. It's good to offer greens, but they will mostly ignore them. They are omnivores.

Tess Cook has a good book on box turtle care free online, and a paperback also available.

 

[gardenjewel]

thanks I will read it!

 

[Yvonne G]

Hi, and welcome to the forum!

Because baby box turtles are so very tiny, they dry out quickly. It is imperative that you keep them in moist substrate and place them in warm water for about 15 minutes daily. I like to use potting soil for my baby box turtles. It's messy, but it keeps them moist. Every morning I dig around and find them all and put them into warm water with a pinch of black worms (black worms can be bought at pet stores that sell aquarium fish). And while they're soaking, I chop up some fruit and veggies into very, very tiny pieces. I place this on a feeding tile then put a small bit of the blackworms on top of the pile. You put the feeding tile right in front of the doorway to their hiding place. Put the babies around the food and step quickly out of their sight.

Good luck raising these babies. It is very rewarding when they eat and start to grow. I'd love to see pictures.

 

[gardenjewel]

Thanks! I will get some blackworms if I can find them and try this. If i have no black worms I will try this with my mmicr meal worms or chopped up worms.