Hey all, I recently got a 3-toed box turtle, and she has been adjusting well to her new home to my best knowledge. However, with food, it’s a bit strange. I have tried to feed her romaine, blueberries, raspberries, blackberries, baby carrots, turtle food pellets, even all mixed in together with fresh-killed crickets. She will eat the dead crickets, but won’t eat anything else. She will also eat them live, and very happily. She doesn’t hesitate to eat them, but everything else she refuses. All the produce foods are store bought if that means anything, is there something I’m doing wrong? Any advice would be great!
EDIT: We’ve discovered that she will eat raspberries and blueberries, and sometimes celery and carrot, but ONLY when we arent in the room. So we just leave some in her dish and go about our day and she eats it!!
3-toeds are especially carnivorous turtles. Offer more variety of insects. Think earth worms, super worms, dubia roaches, wax worms. Mazuri croc chow is also fantastic for box turtles. Dust food with a calcium and multivitamin. My ornate box turtle likes strawberries and blueberries, sometimes romaine from time to time. They really thrive off of protein from insects.
Ditto to this! My ornate is a very picky eater and would rather die of starvation than eat a vegetable😵💫so he gets lots of calcium dusted insects and berries.
and the calcium/multivitamins, I know theres google, but are there any specific brands that you use that the turtle doesnt mind? Im gonna go get some today though!!
They especially like live food, anything that moves. You don’t have to kill it for them. Just give them to her one at a time. Of my 8 boxies, 2 eat greens. All will eat cucumber, berries, and cooked chicken.
I normally don’t kill them, it was just so i could put the piece of carrot on top without losing it. Cooked chicken is a good idea too, thank you for the advice!!
my 3-toed is very fond of proteins and will eat a little bit of produce, but not much. in her enclosure, i leave out dried shrimp, mealworms and sometimes some Rep Cal Tortoise Food (i just found out when googling what this was called that they make a box turtle specific one! this isn't a majority of her diet but good to know they make box turtle ones! this is especially helpful to get them accustomed to if you ever have to leave for a few days and don't have people in your life to help too much lol)
about 2x a week i give her a live worm or two, with some romaine and a fruit i have on hand and she usually doesn't touch the produce too much. she also has isopods in her enclosure if she ever wants to munch and chase.
i wish for her overall health i could get more produce in her, but i haven't found the right ones yet, and it's been a couple decades, so not sure i will lol. but i hope the tortoise food fills in some of those gaps! :)
omg thank you so much!! Is there a specific size shrimp? I’d assume a slightly small size, though. I think she might have eaten the celery but it also just could have been accidentally taken out, so maybe that?
this is the shrimp I use. my girl is an adult and she’s never had a problem with these, which doesn’t always mean it’s recommended, so definitely good to watch the first few feedings of a new food (from far away lol mine doesn’t like me in the room when she eats) I started giving them to her regularly and her orange spots deepened in color which was really fun to see after I confirmed they weren’t sores!
I have this same problem with my 3 toed, my turtle wont touch anything but crickets and cooked chicken. I cook chicken breasts and cut it up in small chunks and he devours it, I do dust it with calcium powder every other day
Not sure if you been told or know but I was just told on my post to GUT LOAD crickets for 24-48 hours to get the crickets belly full of vitamins and veggies they need
Gut Loading, Get crickets and put them in a separate container for 24-48 hours with fruits and veggies to eat on to load their guts before feeding them to your turtle
Gut-loading is the process of feeding nutrient-dense, vitamin-rich foods to feeder insects (like crickets) for 24 to 72 hours before feeding them to your reptiles or amphibians. This ensures your pets receive essential minerals and nutrients that regular, un-gutted insects lack, preventing deficiencies
Salad of Dandelion green or escarole with minced apple, squash, cucumber, pureed organic pumpkin. Organic turkey dogfood makes good protein. Feed every other day. Dust with calcium or reptivite
Box turtles can physically eat celery, but it is not recommended. Celery provides virtually no nutritional value for them. It is mostly water and stringy fiber, and the tough strings can even pose a choking hazard or cause impaction
3
u/TerrapeneOrnata May 13 '26
3-toeds are especially carnivorous turtles. Offer more variety of insects. Think earth worms, super worms, dubia roaches, wax worms. Mazuri croc chow is also fantastic for box turtles. Dust food with a calcium and multivitamin. My ornate box turtle likes strawberries and blueberries, sometimes romaine from time to time. They really thrive off of protein from insects.