Your reptile requires food that meets its dietary needs; whether aquatic turtles or land species (like box turtles), this could include fish and insects for protein intake, plants for vitamins and minerals and commercially produced pellets for calcium supplementation.
Feeding insects and other animals should be done cautiously to minimize pollutant production in waterways. A handful of leafy greens, coupled with one or two insects should provide plenty of nourishment. For most adults this should suffice.
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Fresh Fruit and Vegetables
Turtles thrive when fed a diet consisting of fresh fruits, vegetables and some fish. As a general guideline, their food should primarily consist of vegetables and flowers; whenever possible give your turtle foods that you would eat yourself. Try not to feed anything high in salt content, preservatives or chemicals as this could harm their health.
Leafy greens should be an essential component of any diet; options such as kale, collard greens, mustard greens, bok choy and dandelion greens make excellent additions. Light leaves like iceberg lettuce may not contain enough essential vitamins and minerals for optimal nutrition.
Fruit is a treat and should comprise no more than 20% of any meal. Apples, pears and bananas with skin are good choices; mango, berries and grapes are also delicious choices; also try figs, apricots raisins or star fruit as treats! For flowers try hibiscus carnations roses.
As an additional treat, offer small fish as occasional treats. Be sure to cook it thoroughly – turtles have not evolved to consuming raw seafood in nature, and could pick up bacteria or parasites that could harm them.
Canned Food
There’s no one-size-fits-all answer when it comes to what foods should be fed to turtles, but generally speaking a combination of fresh foods will provide sufficient vitamins and prevent malnutrition. Avoid giving dairy products like milk or yogurt since turtles cannot digest these properly and they could potentially cause illness; also stay away from light-colored vegetables such as iceberg lettuce as they contain limited nutritional value.
Pet food flakes or pellets composed of fish meal, poultry byproduct meal, ground corn and/or pork byproduct meal are an excellent way to provide protein and essential vitamins and minerals to your turtle if fresh produce is limited or unavailable. When giving fresh produce as part of its diet to your turtle be sure to wash it first as some produce could contain pesticides or harmful chemicals which could harm their health.
Pellets
Your turtle should also receive pellets on a daily basis; these specially-formulated foods provide protein and nutrition at just the right ratio, making digestion easy for most turtles.
Avoid giving your turtle dairy products such as milk, yogurt and cheese as turtles do not possess the enzyme needed to break down dairy properly and it may result in diarrhea, infection, poor growth or even death.
Keep the amount of meat you give your turtle as low as possible, if any at all. Although many pet owners give small pieces of deli chicken or fried fish as treats, this should only happen occasionally and not become your turtle’s main source of protein. Instead, opt for high quality turtle foods like Mazuri or Omega One as primary protein sources while offering fish, krill feeder shrimp, Red-leaf lettuce or Anacharis as additional sources of nutrition.
Live Prey
Owners of pet turtles typically feed them live prey items like worms, mealworms, crickets and snails to provide proper nutrition. When it comes to calcium supplementation for your turtle’s diet, crushed eggshells or oyster shells or cuttlebone should be used regularly as sources. Commercial turtle food like Fluker’s Buffet Blend also can provide essential calcium.
Wild turtles are herbivorous animals, feeding on various aquatic and terrestrial plants and fruits. To recreate this diet in your home environment, include leafy greens, vegetables and aquatic plants such as water hyacinths, frogbits, azolla or duckweed in its diet. Avoid human foods like milk cheese and butter as these contain too many oxalates that block calcium absorption.
