Watching your turtle, from time to time, will help you understand your pet’s personality, in addition to this, watching them allows you to quickly pick up if something changes in your pet.
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Why do my turtles get on top of each other?
One odd thing that you may notice with your turtles is the animals getting on top of each other.
If you see this happening once in a while then you likely won’t worry about it too much. However, if you see this happening often then here are the reasons why:
For better rays:
Turtles in the wild are, for the most part, exposed to the same amount of sun rays. The sun shines down on the forest floor evenly and turtles all get enough sun and rays, this isn’t the case in captivity
It is common for turtle enclosures to only have one basking lamp. If this is the case then the turtles will “fight” for warmth and UV exposure.
The turtles “fight” for warmth and UV exposure by stacking on top of each other.
Turtles will climb onto other turtles in order to feel more warmth, stacking gets them closer to heat sources.
Stacking rarely happens in the wild, it only happens if it’s difficult to find a good basking spot.
If one turtle finds a good basking spot, in captivity, then the others will collect in that area, and climb onto each other, to get a good basking spot.
This is simply an example of the animals doing whatever they need to do to receive some light
This behavior is normal and isn’t dangerous as the animal’s shell is usually able to support the weight of the turtle above it, that is, as long as the turtle’s shell is healthy.
If the turtle at the bottom is suffering from shell rot, or from some other preexisting shell condition, then the stacking may cause injuries.
What to do:
If you want to keep these animals from stacking then you’d need to create more basking spaces for the turtles, and you would need to bring in more UV bulbs for the animals to bask under.
When adding the lights make sure that the bulbs are not too close to the animals, if the turtles stack and get too high they can touch the lamp and get burned.
To deter predators:
Another reason why turtles stack is to deter predators. Turtles know that they are prey animals and will do whatever they can to keep from being eaten.
In the wild size matters, looking bigger in a group is better than looking small on your own, your turtles have this instinct in the wild and in captivity.
The animals may be fearful of living in your home, especially when they are still new to, and unfamiliar with, your home. So they will stack to make themselves look less vulnerable to predators (you are a predator to your new turtle).
What to do:
This is also normal behaviour and it isn’t something that you’d need to worry about, the anaimls will stop this behaviour, and stop other types of fearful behaviour, once they get used to being in your care.
Give your pet time to get used to being in your care, and don’t force it to interact with you as a way of getting the animal to like you, this will only make it scared of you.
You can hang out in the room that your pet is in, and you can leave food out for your pet (making sure that the animal sees you doing this) so it associates you with the positive feeling of getting food
Your pet will warm up to you, stop stacking, and will stop being fearful of you over time.