Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations So what do you do with too many turtles?

We have approximately 6 million of these in our five ponds (seems like it anyhow).

They roam the property and either Grandma, or me or my yellar dawg round them up to put em back in the closest pond.




One of our retriever training ponds that's loaded with turtles ...

Feed them ! Mine like to eat .22 mag. vmax

Cappy,

There may be an alternative....there was someone advertising in the Polk County Enterprise recently to buy turtles, alive. If I can find the ad, I'll send you an e-mail

Turtle soup!

I have been trying to find out if red eared sliders (turtles) are edible since I have so many in my pond and they eat a lot of fish food.
Does anyone have a clue?

Eeeuwww. Eat redears? That's like eating toad soup or dog soup or something. Blecch. Alligator snapper and softshell are the "eating" turtles.

I think the .22 Mag. is a better recipe. It knocks them about 15' out of the water.

All seriousness aside, I guess a "trap and relocate" project could work. Pretty labor intensive though. Get ready for some hard work. Maybe an alligator would keep the numbers in check.

I know exactly what they eat, but I have no idea what the impact of a large turtle population is on a pond. Anyone know?

Cappy_TX, back to your original question. Why do you think you have TOO many turtles? I can have a lot of geese or I can have too many geese. Too many implies that they are doing some kind of damage.

Do you know exactly what species you have? Try as I may, I can't imagine what kind of damage they might be doing.

Target practice!

Norm ... For starters, they are feeding on largemouth and channel cat fingerlings we stocked.

Secondarily, when we throw the floating fish food into the ponds I'd like to see FISH begining to feed, not several dozen turtles appearing from all areas of the pond and making a bee line for the fish pellets.

Third, the durn turtles leave the ponds and wander into the barn, garage and anywhere they think they can go for whatever reason they go there. My Labs insist on tracking them down and taking great delight in picking them up and bringing them to me.

First of all, Cappy, I dunno what TX laws are in regards to reptiles, but I know that in some places it is not legal to kill turtles, and in other places it's frowned upon. This may be regardless of whether it's your own private property or not. Chances are killing 'em won't be caught by the AHJ (authority having jurisdiction), but if it is, it could result in some ugly fines.

In regards to you or gramma catching them, you're bolder than me. I have some wierd hangups about handling certain animals. I have no problem handling a gar or pickerel, but am terrified of catfish. I'll handle toads, but not frogs. In much the same vein, I have little fear of snakes (even the "bad" kind), but am pretty petrified of turtles.

Brandon ... I assure you that shooting turtles is not an option for me. That's why I posted this topic to see if folks might offer alternatiove non-leathal measures.

Snakes are another matter. They are fauna non-grata in my ponds. Regardless of what psychological peculiarities might be prompting me to eliminate those dispicable creatures, the main practical reason is because I do NOT want my dawgs to become accustomed to or accepting of snakes of any kind. Both dawgs have been through "snake proofing" to cause them to avoid rattlers, cottonmouths and copperheads that DO exist in our general area. I train Labradors. They are water dawgs. They are fast and aggressive in the water but could not outswim a snake. A snake bite to a dawg is not to be taken lightly. Most dawgs that arwe snake bit in the water get hit on the face near the eyes. Here's an example of what's in store for a snake bit dawg. This one's owned by someone who is a member of our Hunting Retriever Club. http://www.bigdhrc.com:16080/gallery/thumbnails.php?album=5

As far as MY handling turtles are concerned ... I'm not so sure that this rash on my left forearm, elbow and shin is actually poison ivy as opposed to "turtle ivy" that I'm suffering with right now!

Cappy_TX, the first thing to do is to get an accurate species identification. That will tell you about the life history of this species. To change the numbers of this species, you have to change something in its life history. Since you have large numbers of this species, you must be providing an ideal situation for them somehow.

Turtles are like anything else, if they find a food source like pellets, they will use it. Think of bears eating around trash dumps. These individuals will have to be removed. Lots of directions for making turtle traps have been listed. Just put the pellets in the trap. Once the individuals that are eating the pellets are removed, the others may not start again.

Again, let me stress that you must get an accurate species ID to control the population of this species.

Hey, Cappy, unfortunately I have witnessed a snakebitten dog of my own. I used to have a few labs, and one died of a snakebite. So I can certainly understand that you don't want your dogs to accept or "get used to" any snakes. Sorry I can't be of more help on the turtle thing, but Norm's advice sounds really solid, so that should be a starting point. Good luck!

I was determined that i didnt want any turtles, except small ones to eat any dead fish etc. I "relocated"(to turtle heaven) a couple large red sliders and saw a couple eating nearly all the fish chow. I dont live close to the pond, so have no control of this. I fished the pond first time last wk. It has only bream and common shiners I think. I was fishing for bream with small shiners and "BUBBA" my new name for the large slider that would not look at the shiner I was dragging right in front of him, but would follow my little iridescent yellow cork nearly to shore, only to look up passively at where this potential treat might have come from. After a few eye to eye contacts, needless to say BUBBA will be a permanent resident and will probably grow quickly and die young due to over indulgence in the fish chow.

Thanks for the suggestions. We bought the properties in June of 2004. The pond enlargement work continued on through early November. Unfortunately, we didn't beging feeding pellets until after mid-April this year when we stocked the enlarged ponds with bass and catfish fingerlings. There was already a resident population of bass, crappie, bluegill, bullheads and cats in the much smaller original ponds. In addition, there were turtles galore already present so whatever has attracted them apparently still exists.

The snakes that we are seeing are limited to a 7-1/2 acre wetlands we created on a 55 acre property 5 miles north of our homestead. While I personally haven't seen an venomous species there yet, the former owner said he frequently killed copperheads around a corral where he kept a few horses.

Cooperheads are the least aggressive of the venomous snakes in TX and have the least toxic venom. However, I am not impressed by their diminished degree of toxin ... bang - bang is my solution.

I was looking for a better way of getting rid of turtles than shooting or trapping them. I have a turtle trap that I baited and put out for a week and only caught two turtles. Norm turtles compete directly with the fish for pellets which is why I would at least like to thin their numbers. I'm not trying to raise trophy turtles but trophy fish! Apcenter in Texas a valid hunting license is all that is required to kill turtles on private property.

Turtles are NOT welcome at my pond, period. I'll unleash the .22 mag every chance I get. I see the big ole moss backs as a disease waiting to happen. I figure the ones that sink to the bottom create structure !

Hello Jim

As you know we do a lot of wetland habitat for ducks out here. On several of our projects turtles became a problem particularly snappers. Go to E-bay and type in fike net .It will be a small 3 hoop net that is stacked in the water it with catch ALL kinds of turtles and allow you to transport them else where .If need be I can loan you one of mine for a few months. Another thing you may want to try is a turtle sun/box it is just a floating box with tapered sides .The turtle climbs up the side to sun then falls into the box .It will catch painted and teal pot turtle like crazy with out killing them….you can always drown them later hahahah. We trapped a few huge snappers out of water fowl pond when I was home last,it was well over 50lbs…….he became soup!

James, I can't imagine a better way of relocating turtles than shooting them. This relocates them to the side of the pond. Generally, nature takes care of the remains. I have some and have occasionally considered them a problem. If they become a problem, just remember breath control and S-Q-U-E-E-Z-E.

Cappy, I ain't no turtle expert,but seems ta me yer feedin yer own problem. "Me and gramma and the mutt, round em up and put em in the nearest pond". NO, NO, NO!! They just keep multiplyin that way. If ya don't wanna kill em, here's an alternative. Get a tractor innertube, split it opposite the valve stem (makes a good sight), nail it between two trees bout 4" apart. Now ya got yerself a fine turtle slingshot. With the right wind conditions, ya can send em like a Tiger Woods Big Bertha drive. If yer soft hearted, don't worry, they're hard shelled, and will bounce like a superball. If ya got some neighbors ya don't like, take carefull aim, and have fun. Bob-O

I like the way your thinkin Bob-O
turtleapaults
air-turtle-cannon
Some kid tellin his parents "it's raining turtles".

I wonder if the smaller turtles will fit in the clay bird thrower! PULLLLLLLLLLLLL!hahahah

An addendum to my June 27 2005 post. At that time, there were only 2 turtles that were more interested in my bobber than the shiner on the hook. Since I live 375 miles away from my pond, I cant monitor it. I have been feeding the fish heavily since 1st of March. I went last week and had several very large, many large, and a few small red sliders. They were eating nearly all the fish feed. The small ones were chasing and nearly catching the rosy reds. I applied stern punishment with a break barrel .177 pellet rifle with scope and pointed pellets. Next day only 1 turtle showed up to feed. He will probably be twice as big when I go back in about 3 wks. I like the fact they eat the dead fish, but just cant have an exploding population.

This is a photo from the Aquatic Eco-Systems Catalog. When I worked there, this item sold well and worked even better. Most of the Auqaculture guys were very happy with the results. The only problem was having to relocate them. Maybe another persons pond that you are not happy with?

Cappy-
I feel your pain. Our 12 acre lake is loaded with red-eared sliders. And last weekend, I took my 8 year old daughter and 4 of her friends to the farm to fish. On the last cast of the day, one of the girls got "hung up" on something. She eventually dragged what she thought was a sunken log to shore. Now picture in your mind 5 eight-year-old girls coming face-to-face with a 10 pound snapping turtle. It was priceless -- something I'll never forget, and the reason I bought the land in the first place. Unfortunately, the prehistoric creature broke the line, hissed at everyone, and slowly crawled back into the lake...