I have been feeding my turtle some turtle food pellets...but as far as I can tell, he hasn't eaten at all. I've had him for about 3 weeks. How can I get him to eat?

I also have noticed that on each his front arms, he has a patch of larger brown scales over his tiny green ones. So I took a very up close picture of him with my digital camera and enlarged it....they are definitely scales and they are very noticeable. Is this normal? I am worried he might have a infection or something. You can see the picture here: http://www2.snapfish.com/snapfish/slideshow/AlbumID=3934667009/PictureID=179333958009/a=26927368_26927368/

Sorry for all the questions, I just want to take really good care of him!