What to Feed Box Turtles?

What to feed box turtles? In the wild, box turtles are omnivorous creatures. They eat veggies, fruits and small invertebrate insects. When box turtles are at their development stage, they need extra protein in their meals. What to feed box turtles include a gut – loaded diet. Hatchling box turtles are almost exclusively carnivores until they reach a certain age. In this article, you’ll learn what to feed box turtles.

What to Feed Box Turtles: Tips and Tricks

For the most part, box turtles consume insects in the wild. This includes crickets, slugs, roaches, worms and the likes. For most turtle species – both in captivity and in the wild – insects are their most common prey because they are plentiful and small though sometimes they’ll eat larger creatures if they get access to them. What to feed box turtles? In captivity, since they love eating insects, you can gut – load their food so that they can get supplements and have a more nutritious diet. There are some people who reported that there are some box turtles that feed on dead animals like rodents and birds.

What to feed box turtles? They mostly consume plant matter such as moss, lettuce, and other types of greens. They also eat berries and fruits whenever they can find them. Keep this in mind so that you can offer them a varied diet. They also sometimes eat a poisonous mushroom because they can turn it into something poisonous as part of their defense against potential predators.

What to Feed Box Turtles: What You Need to Know

When it comes to feeding box turtles, compared to other household pets, turtle species like the box turtles have a different kind of muscle structures.

Their protective shell are the replacement for bone structures, and as we all know this allows the animal to hide under its own shell if it’s being threatened by predators. The dorsal shell or the top shell is known as the carapace, while the bottom or ventral part is known as plastron.

A turtles shell is covered by scutes which are the bony plates. The scutes are usually being shed in large patches, and not like snake species where they shed their skin in one piece.

The common misconception is that the number of scutes on their shell has something to do with how old a turtle is, it’s just not true.

The chest muscles of turtle species are also well – developed. And despite many differences in a turtle’s muscle structure, they are extremely strong. Turtles also lack teeth but some species have strong beaks that they sometimes use to bite if they are being threatened. These species also have no diaphragm, and they breathe through moving their membranes that encloses their internal organs including their head and legs.

What to feed box turtles have a three – chambered heart compared to mammals that have four – chambers. They also have a renal portal blood system wherein the blood from their hind legs are filtered by their kidneys before it reaches general circulation. This usually means that toxins from their hind limbs are being filtered through their renal organ including drugs that could be injected to them.

It’s also important to know that turtles excrete uric acid as part of their main waste while mammals including humans excrete urea. This allows the turtle to adapt to desert environments where water supply may be limited. Turtles also have a urinary bladder while other reptiles do not.

They also have a receptacle which is also known as cloaca. This is the receiving compartment of their reproductive, urinary and gastrointestinal systems. The cloaca empties externally through the vent on their tail’s surface. 

Box Turtle as Pets

What to feed box turtles In terms of nutritional needs, box turtles in the wild are omnivorous which means that they usually eat a lot of different things. They usually eat things like worms, insects, and other types of small – size invertebrates but they mostly eat a lot of veggies such as leaves, berries and some fruits. In captivity, it’s best to give them an equally varied meal for you to ensure that they’re receiving the right nutrition.    

Box turtles are quite popular and can be ideal pets for first – time turtle owners. One of the things to keep in mind if you want to keep them is their environment. These creatures need enough exposure to real sun. If your pet can’t have enough sun, you have to provide an artificial light source for them to stay healthy. It’s also essential to provide them with the right diet.

They make popular pets because box turtles are generally docile pets that don’t need a lot of maintenance. And although they have quite an exotic look, most people like them because they or more specifically their shells, come in various designs and colors.

They are very docile which means that it’s very safe to pick them up and will not be aggressive. However, it’s also important to note that you shouldn’t pick them up all the time or tempt your fingers at them because they may nip at it. Unfortunately, they may not be suitable for very young children. You can still keep them but just make sure that it’s out of children’s reach. 

Health and Lifespan

There are many hatchlings that die due to exposure during their first winter. The average life expectancy for box turtles in the wild seems to be around 50 years. As a matter of fact, there’s anecdotal evidence that suggests that some specimens can either live to be over a hundred! If you want your pet to live this long, you have to control what to feed box turtles.

Poor ownership tends to decrease when they’re in captivity. A well – cared for turtle that’s born in captivity must at least be able to live with their wild counterparts. We hope in this article, you learned what to feed box turtles. Stay tune for more!