They are two different regional turtles by: Anonymous
I have raised both and can tell you that the yellow earred one if called a Western painted turtle and the red earred is called a Eastern painted turtle. Mine were wild caught and raised to adults with good care. Have since raised many to adulthood and then set them free. The yellow ears come from Minnesota and the red ears from Florida.
It is allowed for educational purposes to keep a few and I do this for the grandchildren who learn to love and respect them and care about turtles. It is important to provide more then turtle pellets and proper lighting. They do bask under light to digest their food properly. But I once a month put in Rosies which are a cheap small fish that can be bought at a pet store. This way they do not forget how to hunt and capture fish to eat when I release them as adults into the wild.
Also once a week I float a small piece of aged looking lettuce or a dandelion leaf or celery leaf and in a few days they eat it all and I remove the rest. This also teaches them not to forget to eat greens in the wild.
In addition I put small angle worms in with them once in a while. You get the idea. Unless you plan on having a large tank with adult turtles, then this is what you do till time to set them free and get new baby turtle to raise.
I have noticed survival rates of wild caught is high at least 9 out of 10. But store bought ones are about 50/50 and my brother in law who use to have a pet store for years says wild ones are just healthier and store bought are all stressed out and half are dead when recieved to pet stores due to overcrowind when shipped.