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Hi all,
I am new to the Tortoise Forum in general but an old timer in chelonia. I am a newb however with Testudo and have been following this thread and soaking up as much info as possible.

I had the opportunity to obtain a small group of Graeca subadults and want to seek input from Dan and others on their potential locality. I've scoured most of the reading material referenced here but feel my skills are not quite yet honed in.

I keep a number of tort species and I am looking to captive breed Graeca but certainly want to be sensitive to the many sub types that may be represented in the group. Of course they all came in together but I know this means little in regards to where they started their journeys.

I'll post a series of consecutive photos and solicite your input.

Great to meet you all.

Regards,

Paul Rattay
Northern California

*They were just soaked so some of them defacated.

I couldn't get the img embedding to work from picasa.

The animals in order:
M1 - Yellow Shell / Orange Tinted skin
M2 - Yellow Shell with some light brown / Yellow skin
F1 - Yellow Shell with some brown / Yellow skin
F2 - Higher Contrast - Darker / Some yellow skin but darker mask

The first three animals have no real masking so I assume they are just yellow variety of ibera from Jordan/Israel? Not sure about the orange male.

Thanks for your input.

Paul

http://picasaweb.google.com/paul.rattay/...3229631810

Figured out the posting.

M1 - Orange Male

M2 - Yellow with some light brown contrast

F1 Yellow with some brown contrast

F2 - darker contrast with some dark masking

Hello, welcome to the forum. Nice looking little tort family you have.

Hi Paul,
Male 1 is a Golden greek, T.g.terrestris. He's the smaller variety, more elongated, more orange in the shell and skin, dark moustache.

Male 2 is a Golden greek, T.g.terrestris. He's the larger variety, lighter colored, more yellow in the carapace, light moustache.

Female 1 is possibly a pure T.g.antakyensis or an antakyensis/terrestris cross.

Female 2 is a light colored Jordanian greek, T.g.ssp

Danny

Thanks for the welcome and for the input from Dan. In the case of the possible cross, would you keep the animals together or attempt to keep terrestris pure from a group management perspective?

I look forward to learning more and sharing information.

Paul

Welcome to the forum - nice looking group!

Hi Paul,
No I wouldn't put the cross or possibly pure T.g.antakyensis in a T.g.terrestris group. I always try to keep groups pure. This always makes sure you have the best compatability and the best fertility rate. With the animals you have your talking about setting up 4 groups
As I keep looking at female 1 I'm more inclined to say she's pure T.g.antakyensis. She's from Syria and there are males out there.
I happen to have a pair of these same T.g.antakyensis from Syria.
My female isn't large enough to lay yet, but the male is adult.

Danny

I guess I'm fortunate to have four different animals to study up close. I do notice F1's more elongated pointy snout and in measurement the 5th vertebral is just ever so slightly longer than the 3rd. Is the vertebral characteristic found even in hatchlings?

All in all, this has helped me along with my being able to differentiate Graeca. Thanks for you input and the helpful posts you have made Dan.

Paul

Your welcome Paul

The only ones I've bred are Jordanian/antakyensis crosses so far and the hatchlings don't have a larger than normal 5th vertebral. Now whether thats a trait of the crosses or maybe of them being female I'm not sure.
I will hopefully be finding out this year as my Lebanese female T.g.antakyensis has a male that matches her now. These guys are pure so will be interesting to see what the hatchlings look like compared to the ones I've got already.

Danny