found a turtle! don't know what to feed!

[Jessika]

I used to work at PetCo and we worked closely with people who were cracking down on stuff like this because these people would come in to buy stuff for their tortoises they found in their backyards and such.

In the United States, it is illegal to take any wild animal from their habitat and keep it as a pet. Yes, people do it, but that does not change the law.

I tried to find specific information but sources were hard to come by (especially when all the links that came up pertained to owning Exotics such as Tigers and Bears lol!)

http://www.aspca.org/site/PageServer...=adopt_exotics
http://www.houstonzoo.org/Wild_Anima...Pets/Index.aqf

Wow finding information is a lot harder than it looks

EDIT: Ahha found something useful finally!

http://ipl.unm.edu/cwl/statbook/indian.html

To obtain permits: http://www.fws.gov/permits/

Federal Law handbook:
http://ipl.unm.edu/cwl/fedbook/index.html

[buttercup132]

Box turtles are really common pets where I live though I dont think there illegal where I live then.

[Jessika]

Box turtles are really common pets where I live though I dont think there illegal where I live then.

"Box Turtles" are not a species of turtles, they're just the land tortoises all lumped into one category. There are MANY different species of tortoises. Some are native to certain areas, some aren't. Some are illegal to own without a permit, some aren't. It just depends on your local laws and what species you wish to keep as a pet. I suggest calling around or even searching online for local conservation laws for your area. Though you live close to me, so our wildlife would be relatively the same, I can not imagine our laws would differ a whole lot.

EDIT: Oops, I meant LUTE lived relatively close to me, sorry

[lute]

i had no idea it was illigal to keep such a small turtle. so many people have pet box tutles around here. i'll let her go.