Chicken Memorials

[craftyhunnypie]

Hi - we have wanted a tortoise for a long time, but I really need to research before 'jumping' in.

I have a lot of questions.

What is the best sort to buy & what age?

What do I need to home one in, must I have a vivarium?

Could it go outside on a nice day?

What do they eat?

Are they dificult to look after?

What do you do when you go on holiday?

Do all tortoises hibernate, if so when & how do you cater for this?

 

Thanks in advance..

 

Emma.x

[Chucky Mama]

I can only really comment with any authority based on our tortoise Kevin. He is approx 40yrs old and is a spur thighed tortoise - the type that everyone used to have in the days when they were imported left right and centre. This is now banned for this type and you can't buy them legally now. Kevin was given to us. He free ranges in our garden when the risk of frost has gone. If he is out when it is cold he buries himself which is not good as if it stays cold he will go back into hibernation. So, he comes in between late October depending on the weather, he slowes down, stops eating, has a warm bath (gets him to do a last pre hibernation poo) and then hibernates himself in the house. He wakes up when ready has a few warm baths (get him drinking) and get put under a heat lamp intermittently during the day and fed until he can go out. Once out feed him a couple of times a week but he finds things around the garden to eat mostly. We monitor his weight to check he is getting enough. He is also wormed twice a year. Our garden is mostly walled but the small part that isn't has to be Kevin proof as he is a past master at escaping. Sorry, don't know much about the little chaps that you can buy but Raina has some. They are great pets, Kev is a real character.

[Raina]

Hi - we have wanted a tortoise for a long time, but I really need to research before 'jumping' in.

I have a lot of questions.

What is the best sort to buy & what age?

What do I need to home one in, must I have a vivarium?

Could it go outside on a nice day?

What do they eat?

Are they dificult to look after?

What do you do when you go on holiday?

Do all tortoises hibernate, if so when & how do you cater for this?

 

Thanks in advance..

 

Emma.x

 

 

Hi,

 

I would say a Hermanns tortoises is the best to buy,you can get them from a couple of months old all the way to a few years old,DON'T Buy from petshops you will most likely get an imported tortoise full of parasites

 

 

The best way to house them would be a Tortoise table,Vivariums aren't recommend as they can cause alot of problems (Respiratory infections ect)

 

The eat mainly a weed diet (It's free ) but during the winter months you can buy lettuce for them.

 

They aren't that difficult to look after,But you do need to keep an eye on them all the time to make sure the don't flip themselves on their backs as they can died within a few minutes of being under the heat lamp if they are on their backs

 

I've never been on Holiday since i've had mine so can't really answer

 

and There is a big discussion going on about hibernation! Some people don't hibernate (I'm one of them) and other people do hibernate.Personally i don't think they need hibernating if they have access to food & heat during the colder months as most animals will hibernate when there is no food or heat about about

 

Some breeds of Tortoise can hibernate (The Mediterranean breeds) and other breeds can't (The Non- Meds)

 

 

Oh and they do cost alot in Bills (Equipment,Electric,Substrate,Housing ect)

 

I hope i've helped

[furry_orange]

all the things in the above post is the best advise i agree totally however i do plan on hibentanting my tortoise as its what the do in the wild and i prefer to keep them as natural as possible and when you go on holiday there are multi options available in nottingham there is white post farm they offer a hotel service where they look after your tort whille on holiday (charges apply i think not yet used it but might use in the future) check your local reptile farms and zoos as a few places offer these sort of services on the other hand family member can always come in and feed clean and bath it, on the other hand forget a holiday or take it with you lol ive done this b4 went on caravan holiday and took the whole thing with me

remeber a tort lives along time so before deciding on 1 you need to make sure and plan for any occassions that may happen to pop up who will look after once your unable to. and also specialised vets in them is always good as normal vets deal with day to day animals (cats and dogs) so this will be slightly more expensive my last check up at vet was just over £20 just a check up so any problems will be costy

[Seagazer]

We got mt YS's horsfield tortoise in Feb. They said he was about a year old, he's quite titchy. He's in a cage ~(like an indoor guinea pig one) with 2 light sources, one is a heat lamp. We were told not to hibernate him until at least 5 years old. He gets lots of different green leaves and weeds from the garden. YS put him outside briefly the other day but got really worried and brought him back in.

 

My ES has looked after him whilst we've been away, we have the lights on a timer but I've just found out a neighbour loves torties and has asked to look after him when we go away. She's very experienced so sounds like a great plan.

 

YS still appears to be enamoured with Jeffrey but he does worry about him a lot, we've never had them before so its a learning curve for all of us.

[Lavenders_Blue]

Hi, can't really add anything to the above. My tortoise is like Chucky Mama's - a now illegal imported european tortoise who lives totally free range and is still as wild and grumpy as the day he arrived with us!

 

There is loads of really good advice on the internet, especially if you are planning on buying a young tortoise, but the only pieces of advice I would offer would be to think about how long they live (decades rather than years) and if you are planning on keeping one outside your garden will need to be completely secure as tortoises can and will both dig and climb! To put this into perspective, we have had our tortoise 30+ years (that's older than me ) and despite knowing his capacity to escape and attempting to secure the garden accordingly, there has barely been a summer when he hasn't got out at some point. Thank goodness for his address painted on his shell

 

A colleague at work also got a young tortoise last summer and I warned her about their ability to escape. She said her garden would be okay as she keeps her rabbit out all day long and it has never escaped. Within a week her tortoise went missing. She looked everywhere and in the end concluded that it had been stolen. I did suggest that it might have dug it's way out but she didn't believe me. 3 months later she found the tortoise trundling around her garden and lo and behold there was a lovely hole under the fence where it had dug itself back in!

 

Not meant to put you off in any way, but just thought I should flag this up - they are expensive pets to go missing!

[Chucky Mama]

I'd echo that, they are very good at climbing, digging and bulldozering their way through things. Good garden security is essential if they are to free range which is the healthiest way to keep a tortoise once they are large enough to do so.

[Raina]

Yes they are brilliant climbers & diggers,

 

Just take a look at this picture of My Hermann's tortoise,He did once climb all the way to the top & fell,i thought he would of cracked his shell open,Thank goodness he didn't