Three Striped Mud Turtle

One of the smallest, and best species to keep, Three Striped Mud Turtles (Kinosternon baurii), are a joy to have in a tank. They are very active, learn to recognize their keepers, and forage endlessly along the bottom of their tank. With the typical adult size of barely four inches, these are one of the world's smallest turtles. They are tiny when born - and well started hatchlings are only an inch long at best ...

Also known as Striped Mud Turtles, they are found from coastal South Carolina and Georgia, south through peninsular Florida and the Keys. Because much of their range has been heavily developed in recent decades, habitat destruction and road kills have threatened this species significantly. All range states now appropriately protect this species. Captive breeding of Three Striped Mud Turtles has made great strides in recent years - and they are now more available.

Three Striped Mud Turtles do not need a large tank - well started hatchlings are very small, and do well in the smallest of tanks, and a 20 gallon "long"aquarium can easily house 2 or 3 adults for life.

They like shallow water, with a bit of gravel & lots of underwater "tank furniture" (plastic plants, rocks, logs etc.). We raise ours on pellets, occasionally giving them cut fish, cut beef heart and small earth worms. They happily take any type of protein food, and they enjoy small insects & crustaceans - and will learn to eat from your hand, if you like. They get along with any similar sized mud or musk turtles -and because we save and raise them up to go with turtles you may already have - or to put them in a larger tank, we have them available in several sizes.

Remember, each turtle order comes with a free starter sample of the same Turtle diet your Turtle has been raised on - this will last one small turtle a few weeks - to order larger quantities, see the lower left side of this page. *