Bristlenose and Turtles

Hi Guys
I just got myself a 3F tank and a lil baby eastern long neck turtle who is the size of about a 20c piece. I have had bristlenose before and was thinking about getting a breeding pair to go into the tank with my baby turtle. Im just wondering if they will still breed or will they be put off? I have heaps of logs for hiding etc but thought id check with you experts first.

Thanks!

I must say ive never kept the two together before, your setup sounds ideal but turtles will venture around the bottom and feed off anything they can get the hands on ie. BN eggs lol....

I will have a look into it for you first ...

thanks for your reply
I had thought of that but thought i could get those pot plants for them to lay their eggs in but get silicone etc and make the entrance smaller so the turtle couldnt get in but the fish can, and i could also surround it with driftwood (although of corse there are no guarentees they would breed in there)...but i could try and make it hard for the turtle

its not so much the eggs i would be worried about, its the breeders themselves. Turtles are not know for the agressive tendencies but look at what people feed them...meat! in the wild they get this in several ways, one of which is catching fish. just dangle your finger in front of a mature turtle and see how fast they can move, and hope you are faster cos it really hurts if they get you The biggest risk i can see would be for the male when he is guarding his new eggs. his tail sticking out of the cave would just be too tempting for the turtle to pass up...chomp, drag, num num num.

Have to agree , It would be very risky..

I've kept turtles in with a variety of fish, and the one thing they steered well clear of was the plec. The other fish started disappearing, so i had to move the rest out, but left the plec in. this was an 8 inch plec though. I personally wouldn't risk anything smaller than that.

My cousin regularly feeds his turtles goldfish so I would be pretty woried about the two being together if it were me.

turtles and bristlenose are a no no you're turtle will soon make short work of a bristlenose.
my daughter as a turtle and believe me it can move when it wants too its even eaten a red clawed crab.

fair enough if its an adult turtle but i have guppies in with him at the moment & he hasnt even noticed them....yet. I even have tiny baby ones and they are still alll there.

here is a photo so you can see the size of him:



I'll see how he goes with the guppies for a few more weeks and go from there, maybe i'll need to get another tank

Oh he is so cute,
As cute as it is...I still wouldn't put it in with any of my fish ifn I wanted to keep em safe...It will come down to instinct, It's natural for a turtle to munch on fish .

While he is small he may bide his time then as you became complacent, he would decide he could now finish a whole one. I would say he could be a good outlet for keeping fry under control though.

I have decided to put a divider in the tank. He still hasnt touched my guppies but dont want to take the risk with the new fish im getting tonight. I nice large, feisty male bistlenose catfish, am sooo excited!!!!

We had friends visit on Sunday and their turtle is beheading all the guppies!! So beware. Personally, I wouldn't put any fish that was smaller than the turtle in with it, although to be honest, I wouldn't put any in, as they sure can nip.

Angi

heidii wrote:

I have decided to put a divider in the tank. He still hasnt touched my guppies but dont want to take the risk with the new fish im getting tonight. I nice large, feisty male bistlenose catfish, am sooo excited!!!!

I have a friend who lives close by and he ended up isolating the turtle as it picked the small fry off in the night,

you could use a tank divider, and silicone it to the sides and bottom so you can have both... I have seen that before... though some turtles still climb over the top...... lol......

I would not put him in with the breeding pair at all... dont think it is worth the risk.....

would highly recommend to keep him divided at the least.......

turtles can be nice as much as BN, I am sure you will eventually find a happy medium... let us hope it is with very minor or no casualties...lol...

I had 2 turtles that size i caught in a lake, brought them home put them in a 20 gallon went back to the lake and caught a newt, a few differnt small fish that were as big as the turtles and one buy one watched them go down soon after that i was feeding them goldfish about a half inch bigger than the turtles and it got ugly. I wouldnt trust a turtle with a BN at all.

I know this is an old post but I am a new member here but I am also a very experienced fresh water turtle keeper and I thought I would just post my thoughts.

The common rule of thumb is to never put anything with your turtle if you want it to survive, especially a ELN as they are good hunters and will eventually get hold of your BN.

The best thing to have in your turtle tank with your turtles is only the feeder fish you want them to eat (the cheap feeder fish from LPS)

I will admit, I had a couple of my BN in with my short neck turtle (I have many many turtles) and they lived happily this way for about a year, then all of a sudden I found the BN fighting for life with it's tail end completely missing.
I managed to save him and it has regrown but in a odd way and this is the reason for me joining up here today, cause he has just had his first spawn and I knew nothing about what to do cause my BN were mainly just for helping keep my tanks clean, not for breeding purposes.
So it's just not worth it if you want your BN to survive, cause nature is nature and a turtle needs to eat too:)

Also, due to the size of your lil turtle and to avoid any health issues now or in the future, something a lot of people are not aware of with captive bred turtles, is with any feeder fish you put in the tank, please ensure they are no bigger than the turtles head otherwise they can get intimidated easily and this stress causes health issues quickly.
Also make sure you have plenty of fish in the tank for him to catch, especially if it's a big tank.
For a 3ft tank, I suggest at least 150 feeders.

I hope this has been helpful somewhat, your welcome to PM me if you want to know anything else turtle related.