Duncan the Terrapin

Hello again,

Today I am going to do a post on my pet Terrapin. I thought I would write about him because I do love him loads but also lots of people have started posting pictures and tweeting that they want one and I just wanted to give more information out there about them because they are lovely pets but a lot more hard work then you would expect.  

Duncan is mine and my boyfriends terrapin and we have had him for about a year and a half now. He is a yellow belly slider terrapin, when we were researching into them we thought that they were just the cutest and had the nicest markings :) 

When we bought him he was tiny, the size of a 50p. He was so small and fragile we were scared we were going to hurt him. We had the tank all set up and ready to go for him before we brought him home. The tank was massive for him then as he darted around it. It was a big learning curve for us as the basking area we first had wasn't right and the first filter wasn't strong enough for him when he grew and little things like that. 

As you can see in the picture below, that is his current tank. We have a larger filter for him, a heater, a basking area, basking light and some decoration which as you can also see he has already knocked over before the picture was taken. We did have large pebbles in the bottom to start but we found they collected dirt and were hard to keep clean, so we took them out.

His tank is simple but that's how we wanted it as there is more room for him and he seems to enjoy it :) 

I would also like to point out that even though they are only £15 to buy, you have everything to also get. To properly set yourself up with all the correct stuff I would say it would cost around £200, and then you need to keep buying the food, water cleaner and everything when they run out. They also need cleaning a lot, they do make a lot of mess and the filter and water needs cleaning. We normally do small water changes when it needs it but also full cleans about once even month and a half. These take about an hour, if not longer so be prepared to clean! We are looking at buying a bigger tank at the moment because next year I am having him at university with me so we thought it was the perfect time to get a new tank :)

I love this little guy so much and I am so pleased that we got him. He will grow a bit more but I would say he is nearly full size :)  

Do you have any strange pets? Or if you have any questions about the up keep and looking after terrapins I'm happy to answer them :)

Hope you've enjoyed reading and speak to you soon

Bye :)