# Breeding for traits



## robopeen (Apr 10, 2013)

I really enjoy keeping my tortoise and am in the process of hopefully adopting another. In the future I might want to breed tortoises, but if I did I think I'd want to breed tortoises for pets. 

I would want to choose the individuals who are most friendly and confident and breed them specifically for the purpose of being pets. I'm not sure if they trade would even support something like that or I'd be seen as a backyard breeder? 

What do most here breed for? Do you breed for color? For shows (I believe there are shows, right)? For physical traits? For personality traits? Are personality traits even passed on with tortoises? 

Tell me what you think!


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## wellington (Apr 10, 2013)

IMO, you cannot breed for personality like you can a dog. They are not dogs. IMO, you can't breed for "pets" in the way you are thinking. This is just my opinion. I don't breed tortoises, however I used to breed dogs. Not the same!


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## robopeen (Apr 10, 2013)

wellington said:


> IMO, you cannot breed for personality like you can a dog. They are not dogs. IMO, you can't breed for "pets" in the way you are thinking. This is just my opinion. I don't breed tortoises, however I used to breed dogs. Not the same!



Yeah that's why I was really curious about it. Actually I think my phrasing was wrong. When I mean pet I just mean more resilient to stress really. To me, a tortoise who stresses easily wouldn't make a good animal to keep in terms of interactions. It's too bad those traits don't carry.


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## SmileyKylie623 (Apr 10, 2013)

Tortoises are very old creatures and still "wild". I don't think you could breed them for anything but size and color- physical traits basically. They are little dinosaurs and evolution has not changed them much and in my opinion you could not breed "pet" personalities. It would be all about how much you handled the offspring not genetics. Then again I'm not an expert in these field. I've only got experience with breeding dogs and horses.


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## Tom (Apr 10, 2013)

No reason this couldn't be done, but it would take several human lifetimes to make much progress given how long it takes them to mature. I definitely see personality traits carried from parent to offspring, but each clutch will also have a lot of personality variation among the individuals.


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## WillTort2 (Apr 10, 2013)

This raises the question that is often asked by human psychologists; is behavior primarily controlled by heredity or life experiences?

While we can not equate human with tortoises as far as emotion and behavior, basic needs as food, safety, and comfort motivate all creatures on a basic level.

With tortoises, self protection vs. food seem to be daily motivations. And during seasonal times add the desire to mate, which can trump all other concerns.

Interesting topic.


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## robopeen (Apr 10, 2013)

Tom said:


> No reason this couldn't be done, but it would take several human lifetimes to make much progress given how long it takes them to mature. I definitely see personality traits carried from parent to offspring, but each clutch will also have a lot of personality variation among the individuals.



Awesome, good to know. My girl is extremely outgoing and fearless. I call her a female because she's large for her age but I know that's not really indicative of gender, especially at her young age. But I think breeding her with another fearless Hermann's would put some more brave Hermann's in the genetic pool, if you will. I see so many people who have issues with shy Hermann's who hide, or don't eat, or whatever. If I can breed some who can handle the change and chaos better, that would be great. I think it's something I will def try in 5-7 years.




WillTortoise said:


> This raises the question that is often asked by human psychologists; is behavior primarily controlled by heredity or life experiences?
> 
> While we can not equate human with tortoises as far as emotion and behavior, basic needs as food, safety, and comfort motivate all creatures on a basic level.
> 
> ...



I've always really stood by both nature and nurture having an impact on the outcome.

Like perhaps, some wild caught tortoises never really warm up to humans because they are naturally cautious, but if they had been hand-raised they might have just stressed about coming into a new house but the would calm down in a couple days.

We can't really know, but it would be interesting to compare.


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## Deac77 (Apr 11, 2013)

This is interesting and it's currently being attempted in the chameleon world its fairly controversial because chameleon morphs are just now taking off (translucent really the only one atm other than blue and orange phases in vieldeds) and to do this some are Ignoring "morphs" but it's APPARENTLY having quite a bit of success.


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## kjr153 (Apr 11, 2013)

I would never be able to breed Tortoise's because then I would feel responsible when I saw a baby in a Petstore in all of the wrong living conditions imaginable. I understand somone has to breed them to keep the population going but in my opinion they are so over bred and most people do not know the proper way to care for a hatchling (myself included at first). Craigslist really opened my eyes to this problem. When you see a hatchling in a ten gallon aquarium on rabbit pellets and no water, because they're desert animals and don't need water, so the Petstore told them. No hard feelings here just my opinion. Just out of curiosity, anyone that breeds, Do you send some kind of care sheet with your hatchling to their new home? I do realize many animals are over bred and it's sad. The difference in my opinion is that, yes most people can keep a tortoise alive and that is because they are pretty hardy animals, but what about their quality of life? I am speaking about myself from past experience. Before I found this site I honestly had no idea how to care for my Sulcata and I did about a month of research before getting it. I thought I was taking darn good care of my Tort until I talked to a few people on here. Then I felt really bad for my Tortoise. I immediately changed EVERYTHING I was doing.


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## Redari (Apr 11, 2013)

kjr153, there are many of species of tortoise that are endangered, so your concerns don't apply at all to those breeds. Breeders of endangered tortoises are actually doing a really good thing to keep those populations going.

I think this is a great idea, the only drawback is that tortoises have such slow reproduction time it and it would take several generations to see real progress. In Russia they domesticated foxes in 50 years in a long-term study, and they sexually mature much faster. Tortoises are not social animals so you would have much less to work with, but I'm sure you could breed for more outgoing personalities, higher activity, etc. I'd love to do this with Stars one day if I had a lot of space.


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## CtTortoiseMom (Apr 11, 2013)

I have three tortoises with three very different personalities. I love all tortoises and turtles regardless of their personality and think it us fun to find out "who" they are. That said, my question is of all the keepers here, who would pay more for a specific personality type? Now that you brought it up, I am curious to see if there is an actual market for this in the tortoise world.


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## robopeen (Apr 11, 2013)

Deac77 said:


> This is interesting and it's currently being attempted in the chameleon world its fairly controversial because chameleon morphs are just now taking off (translucent really the only one atm other than blue and orange phases in vieldeds) and to do this some are Ignoring "morphs" but it's APPARENTLY having quite a bit of success.



Awesome, that is encouraging!




kjr153 said:


> I would never be able to breed Tortoise's because then I would feel responsible when I saw a baby in a Petstore in all of the wrong living conditions imaginable. I understand somone has to breed them to keep the population going but in my opinion they are so over bred and most people do not know the proper way to care for a hatchling (myself included at first). Craigslist really opened my eyes to this problem. When you see a hatchling in a ten gallon aquarium on rabbit pellets and no water, because they're desert animals and don't need water, so the Petstore told them. No hard feelings here just my opinion. Just out of curiosity, anyone that breeds, Do you send some kind of care sheet with your hatchling to their new home? I do realize many animals are over bred and it's sad. The difference in my opinion is that, yes most people can keep a tortoise alive and that is because they are pretty hardy animals, but what about their quality of life? I am speaking about myself from past experience. Before I found this site I honestly had no idea how to care for my Sulcata and I did about a month of research before getting it. I thought I was taking darn good care of my Tort until I talked to a few people on here. Then I felt really bad for my Tortoise. I immediately changed EVERYTHING I was doing.



First of all, any babies I bred I would offer them to forum members or other experienced owners exclusively. If I were to do a breeding project I would like to be able to keep tabs on where they all go and if the owner was no longer able to keep it I would request the tortoise was returned to me. They would never go to a pet store and I would never give a tortoise to a potential owner who had no idea what they were doing. I don't expect many people here would either. Before I got a tortoise I did literally MONTHS of research.

Also, buying from pet stores because you think the animal is in poor conditions is a really bad idea. Once you buy that animal they then order more. You're only perpetuating the cycle of tortoises being wild caught, kept in poor conditions, and unaware owners. You could suggest changes to the store and maybe bring in some care sheets for them to give to potential owners but buying them is not helping overall.

Lastly, if I were to do this project I would ideally want to work with Greek or Egyptian tortoises. Both of which are threatened species. Breeding a large pet population can cut into the shipment of at least wild Greeks and benefit the species over all.




Redari said:


> kjr153, there are many of species of tortoise that are endangered, so your concerns don't apply at all to those breeds. Breeders of endangered tortoises are actually doing a really good thing to keep those populations going.
> 
> I think this is a great idea, the only drawback is that tortoises have such slow reproduction time it and it would take several generations to see real progress. In Russia they domesticated foxes in 50 years in a long-term study, and they sexually mature much faster. Tortoises are not social animals so you would have much less to work with, but I'm sure you could breed for more outgoing personalities, higher activity, etc. I'd love to do this with Stars one day if I had a lot of space.



I've read a lot about that wolves and I must admit, it's where I got my idea from. I think working with a smaller species like Greeks would help cut down on the time, but no doubt about it, it would be a lengthy project. But tortoises live a long time too, I think it would be worth it to pursue.




CtTortoiseMom said:


> I have three tortoises with three very different personalities. I love all tortoises and turtles regardless of their personality and think it us fun to find out "who" they are. That said, my question is of all the keepers here, who would pay more for a specific personality type? Now that you brought it up, I am curious to see if there is an actual market for this in the tortoise world.



I agree, my favorite part of adopting a new animal is getting to know them as an individual. I don't know that if I were to pursue this project I would charge more for the specifically bred ones, it wouldn't be more expensive for me, I'd just have to be more choosy with who I let reproduce.

If you go through like the species specific forums of the Russians, Hermann's, and Greeks, you see a lot of people commenting on the tortoise not eating when they first come to a new home and being generally shy. I imagine breeding tortoises who are more outgoing would mean it's less stressful for the tortoise and the owner. They'd be more adaptable and willing to eat and the owners would be less worried about them.


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## wellington (Apr 11, 2013)

kjr153 said:


> I would never be able to breed Tortoise's because then I would feel responsible when I saw a baby in a Petstore in all of the wrong living conditions imaginable. I understand somone has to breed them to keep the population going but in my opinion they are so over bred and most people do not know the proper way to care for a hatchling (myself included at first). Craigslist really opened my eyes to this problem. When you see a hatchling in a ten gallon aquarium on rabbit pellets and no water, because they're desert animals and don't need water, so the Petstore told them. No hard feelings here just my opinion. Just out of curiosity, anyone that breeds, Do you send some kind of care sheet with your hatchling to their new home? I do realize many animals are over bred and it's sad. The difference in my opinion is that, yes most people can keep a tortoise alive and that is because they are pretty hardy animals, but what about their quality of life? I am speaking about myself from past experience. Before I found this site I honestly had no idea how to care for my Sulcata and I did about a month of research before getting it. I thought I was taking darn good care of my Tort until I talked to a few people on here. Then I felt really bad for my Tortoise. I immediately changed EVERYTHING I was doing.



Don't feel bad, your not the only one. I did a lot of research myself. Listened to the breeder, as she seem to really know her stuff and had the knowledge. I ended up with my tort pyramiding. Granted, that's the only real bad info I got from her. Then I found TFO and thankfully was able to change things and get him to start growing smoother, but of course the pyramiding, is there forever


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## Kapidolo Farms (Apr 11, 2013)

Hi robopeen,

Yes you can breed tortoises for specific traits, many are doing it here and offer the offspring for sale. Chinese softshells are being selected for quick growth and weight gain as a food item, some species are being selected for albinism, or other color traits.

One TFO member was/is breeding narrow bridge mud turtles for high color, did not find the post for the images of the set-up.

But as Tom mentions the turn around is slow, unless your selection pool, the number of offspring you are selecting from, is huge, so you can pick the individuals with the strongest 'signal' for the trait you select for it may never become a conspicuous trait, enough that you can effectively select for it, color is sorta easy compared to behavior.

There is a well know text book example of foxes being bred to look like collies, and then they end up behaving like collies too. Many traits are linked, so selecting for one that is easy to find, may result in selecting for one that is not easy to see.

The Temple Grandin book about talking to animals is an interesting read, and covers this topic as it relates to a few species, all mammals though. That interesting read part is the key, and watching the movie with Claire Danes won't cover that aspect of the work of Temple Grandin.

Will


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## GeoTerraTestudo (Apr 11, 2013)

Captive breeding is a good way to prevent capture from the wild. However, unless absolutely necessary, I don't think it's a good idea to breed for specific traits. The reason is that you lose valuable genetic diversity when you try to fix a certain trait in a lineage. Even if you try to breed away from genetic disorders, genetic diversity is still lost, and can lead to inbreeding depression. Pet tortoises already come from such small gene pools. Why shrink them even more? Breed for health and diversity within a species or subspecies, not for traits that catch the fancy of humans.

As for comparing tortoises to dogs, there is some comparison to be made, of course, since we all have behavior influenced by our genetics. However, dogs are much more genetically variable, and also breed faster than tortoises. Dogs were domesticated from wolves 15,000-30,000 years ago, and today are calmer and safer to be around as a result. They also work with us, protect us, play with us, etc. Tortoises, on the other hand, are harmless herbivores and do not work, so there is no pressing need to alter their behavior. It might be fun to have more outgoing tortoises, but it's not worth the risk when you consider that they could become inbred. If anything, rather than breeding for a certain phenotype, just let those tortoises that thrive in captivity and resist disease reproduce, since that also has to do with being unstressed, as well as a good immune system and good health overall.






Deac77 said:


> This is interesting and it's currently being attempted in the chameleon world its fairly controversial because chameleon morphs are just now taking off (translucent really the only one atm other than blue and orange phases in vieldeds) and to do this some are Ignoring "morphs" but it's APPARENTLY having quite a bit of success.



I don't think it's a good idea to breed color morphs in the lizard world, either. For one thing, I think wildtype is more attractive anyway, but more importantly, the population is more likely to develop genetic disorders when you do that.




Here's a clip on the famous Dmitry Belyaev experiment, in which foxes were domesticated by breeding for docility. The result was very doglike foxes that were calmer and less likely to bite the hand that fed them. Appearance also changed, resulting in piebald patterning, floppy ears, and curly tails. This experiment was groundbreaking, in showing that all the changes in behavior and appearance that come about from domestication really stem from a reduction in adrenalin and cortisol. It's thought that wolf domestication may have followed a similar path thousands of years ago, producing dogs. But again, there was a need to make powerful carnivores friendlier and more useful. Many of the changes since then have weakened the domestic wolf, not improved upon it.

[video=youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EoB0pdhxfZs[/video]

See also the following video (despite the ridiculous title, as dog evolution does not contradict evolution):

[video=youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZEOjlsUd7j8[/video]


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## robopeen (Apr 11, 2013)

Will said:


> Hi robopeen,
> 
> Yes you can breed tortoises for specific traits, many are doing it here and offer the offspring for sale. Chinese softshells are being selected for quick growth and weight gain as a food item, some species are being selected for albinism, or other color traits.
> 
> ...



If I'm breeding for tortoises that handle stress well it's going to be hard, but I think that's one of the most obvious traits. I'm not sure though, so I'm going to go to a reptile show soon where I can see a large amount of tortoises so I can devise some kind of baseline and test that I can use to easily identify that trait. 

Like you said, some traits are linked. I wonder how much stress in the wild contributes to certain things in captive bred, calm tortoises. It's such a hard thing to judge though because so many are still being wild caught. We don't have generations of captive breds to look at and compare too. But we've got to start somewhere.




GeoTerraTestudo said:


> Captive breeding is a good way to prevent capture from the wild. However, unless absolutely necessary, I don't think it's a good idea to breed for specific traits. The reason is that you lose valuable genetic diversity when you try to fix a certain trait in a lineage. Even if you try to breed away from genetic disorders, genetic diversity is still lost, and can lead to inbreeding depression. Pet tortoises already come from such small gene pools. Why shrink them even more? Breed for health and diversity within a species or subspecies, not for traits that catch the fancy of humans.
> 
> As for comparing tortoises to dogs, there is some comparison to be made, of course, since we all have behavior influenced by our genetics. However, dogs are much more genetically variable, and also breed faster than tortoises. Dogs were domesticated from wolves 15,000-30,000 years ago, and today are calmer and safer to be around as a result. They also work with us, protect us, play with us, etc. Tortoises, on the other hand, are harmless herbivores and do not work, so there is no pressing need to alter their behavior. It might be fun to have more outgoing tortoises, but it's not worth the risk when you consider that they could become inbred. If anything, rather than breeding for a certain phenotype, just let those tortoises that thrive in captivity and resist disease reproduce, since that also has to do with being unstressed, as well as a good immune system and good health overall.
> 
> ...






I'm not sure how we would lose genetic diversity. If the offspring don't have the desired outcome I'm not going to dispose of them. I'd of course make them available to other people to keep and breed instead. I would also like to start my own tree for whatever breeding I may do to ensure the gene pool stays as deep as it can. I can't see how breeding new offspring from as many unrelated pairs I can find will hurt the genetics of the animals in any significant way. If you're implying I would breed related cousins or siblings to get these traits, you're incorrect. I am fairly certain these traits, being more mental than physical, will be easier to find and breed for instead of a unique color mutation.

I'm not really sure what you mean when you say the experiments on domesticating the foxes have weakened them, they're just different. 

If anything I'd like to see how the tortoises will change due to lower cortisol levels if they even produce them in the same way.


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## ascott (Apr 11, 2013)

I would think that if you are wanting a specific "personality" then you will want to educate yourself in specific species traits;

Russian torts ; outgoing, rufians (in a good way, well, to me anyway) mountain climbers, scrappers, brumate

Redfoot torts; quirky, a bit more laid back, shy appearance...lurk around silently like and a sweet type of critter, does not brumate

Sulcata; BIG  tenacious, regal...plow through to get to where they feel they should be, outgoing..., does not brumate

Pancakes; hiders, quiet...not a forward outgoing tort....

There are so many variations of "personality" based on what traits different species "usually" demonstrate...

(the above descriptives of course are for example and there is no way that I could have listed all the wonderful characteristics of each....)

I do not think that you can breed for form or function in a reptile the way people try to do with mammals.....


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## GeoTerraTestudo (Apr 12, 2013)

robopeen said:


> I'm not really sure what you mean when you say the experiments on domesticating the foxes have weakened them, they're just different.



No, what I said was that altering the _wolf_ a great deal has weakened it. Some dogs, like the primitive pariahs and huskies, or the larger sporting and herding dogs, have remained pretty strong and healthy. However, with inbreeding, even they tend to develop skeletal and immunological problems. As for the smaller non-sporting breeds, many of them are very unhealthy. They tend to have not only joint problems, but also skin, neurological, and breathing problems. By selecting for one trait, such as color, say, you inevitably lose genetic diversity, which can lead to genetic disorders.

The point of the fox videos was to show that, yes, you can select for a certain type of behavior, and in the case of foxes (and probably wolves long ago), the change can come about pretty quickly. If you wanted to breed for a more outgoing strain of Russian tortoises, it could probably be done, although perhaps not as quickly. However, I just want to encourage you to maintain a nice, big gene pool, so that you don't end up with inbreeding, the way pedigreed dogs, cats, and horses tend to.


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## robopeen (Apr 12, 2013)

GeoTerraTestudo said:


> robopeen said:
> 
> 
> > I'm not really sure what you mean when you say the experiments on domesticating the foxes have weakened them, they're just different.
> ...



Oh yes, I totally agree. Some breeds suffer from so many health problems it's kind of mind blowing. You would never suspect they were the descendants of wolves. Physical changes aren't my goal though and if I started seeing any I would stop breeding and advise everyone on what I found so it wouldn't happen again. I have no desire to create malformed or weaker tortoises.

I'm still not sure what species I would like to breed, but it will definitely been one of the Mediterranean species due to size constraints on a large project like this. My goal would be to get two unreleased females and two unrelated male, breed them, then breed their offspring then pick the two or three best and get two or three outside tortoises to breed with them. At that point I'd probably start finding other people's tortoises to breed with, this is all far in the future though.

I do not believe in inbreeding, which some people do depending on the animal they are breeding, Bettas for example people will often breed a mother with her own offspring. Tbh I just find it icky.

Also to prevent inbreeding at all costs I was considering putting a small epxoy tag on all my bred tortoises. I don't know if that would prevent people from adopting them though. I would hope not, but you can never be sure.


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## Kapidolo Farms (Apr 12, 2013)

Many of the terms scientists use, in scientific literature get muddled, let alone narratives like we use here on TFO.

Traits are represented by different genes in a gene location on a chromosome. Any one of several actual genes may be in that location, each of which can be expressed in some way different from an alternate gene in the same gene place. Often people talk about hair color or eye color. It would probably be near true that each gene place has more than one actual gene that can fit on any one of the several chromosomes in your total allotment of DNA.

These alternative genes are more properly called alleles. Each individual has one set of alleles. However in a large population, lets say all the individuals in a species - there may be dozens of alleles and certainly thousands of combinations. All that species' individuals variation is like a pool of tools ready for whatever each generation may need. 10,000 born, maybe 99.9% of the alleles will be there, by the time those 10,000 get to reproduce some of the individuals will no longer be alive, for many reasons, but among those reasons is the mix of alleles some of the individuals have. Over many generations in a stable environment some alleles will become more widely represented in the population, but most all alleles will still be somewhere in the mix.

When we select for one trait (allele) we also eliminate others by default. We don't have enough individuals to make sure we have all the alleles in our small populations. So when we breed for a trait, we exclude other versions of the trait, and balance the alleles for our stable environment, not the environment outside in the wild.

If this is good or bad is an opinion, mine tends to align with the idea to keep as much diversity as possible. Those that survive the process of being collected and raised in captivity, have already gone under a huge selection of some suite of traits. That is a first big selection process for alleles.

Will


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## Terry Allan Hall (Apr 16, 2013)

Tom said:


> No reason this couldn't be done, but it would take several human lifetimes to make much progress given how long it takes them to mature. I definitely see personality traits carried from parent to offspring, but each clutch will also have a lot of personality variation among the individuals.



Agreed,,,while breeding a *friendly* tortoise to another *friendly* tortoise, then breeding the *friendliest* offspring to another *friendly* tortoise would very likely result in *very friendly *tortoises, it would quite likely take a VERY long time, indeed!


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