# Male or Female?



## delilah (Oct 25, 2011)

Can anyone tell if this is a male or female for me please?


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## Yvonne G (Oct 25, 2011)

Looks male to me.


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## jeffbens0n (Oct 25, 2011)

That's a toughie...i'm going to agree with Yvonne and say male...how big is he?


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## babylove6635 (Oct 25, 2011)

I THOUGHT FEMALES HAD SHORT FAT TAILS?


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## delilah (Oct 25, 2011)

jeffbens0n said:


> That's a toughie...i'm going to agree with Yvonne and say male...how big is he?



Umm not sure how big he is now...just tried to measure him but he's sleeping so it's abit difficult..about 5inches long + he's 4 years old


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## jackrat (Oct 25, 2011)

I'm guessing male also.


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## Jacqui (Oct 25, 2011)

babylove6635 said:


> I THOUGHT FEMALES HAD SHORT FAT TAILS?



It is a little more complicated then that. This tail, is a bit short, but not truly short, which I bet with age will lengthen. Males have the thick tails, because think of the huge penis they have to be able to get in there.  Then notice the cloaca (the vent hole) is located closer to the end of the tail rather then the body. Also on a Hermanns look at the body shape, a male tends to be wider at the rear (unlike humans ). Also notice how the shell surrounding the tail sorta point outward? That is another male sign. This guy is young, so his sexual determining signs are still not fully apparent, but should become more obvious with age.

Everything points to it being a young immature male, but this fella also gave his owner one other big sign the other day, to make the sex easy to determine.


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## GBtortoises (Oct 25, 2011)

(Now) Looks like a male Greek tortoise to me. Do you have a photo of the carapace?


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## Jacqui (Oct 25, 2011)

GBtortoises said:


> Looks like a female Greek tortoise to me. Do you have a photo of the carapace?



She isn't online right now, but her other thread shows just a tad of the carapace.

http://www.tortoiseforum.org/Thread-Can-anyone-tell-me-what-this-is#axzz1bp1XfC00


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## DesertGrandma (Oct 26, 2011)

@ Jacqui: Males have the thick tails, because think of the huge penis they have to be able to get in there.


Is their penis in their tail? Guess I just thought it came out of their body.


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## Jacqui (Oct 26, 2011)

DesertGrandma said:


> @ Jacqui: Males have the thick tails, because think of the huge penis they have to be able to get in there.
> 
> 
> Is their penis in their tail? Guess I just thought it came out of their body.



Good question! To be honest I don't know where it all fits in. Some would, I think, still be having to be left at all times within the tail structure. I was more referring to the fact the penis (where ever it is stored) has to be able to easily slide in and out of the tail structure. (boy that sounded bad  ). I need to find some place that will tell/show me exactly how that works.

The female tail has to stretch to deposit the eggs, but if you ever watch that takes a long amount of time and much straining. One reason the cloaca opening is right there next to the body not further out like a male's.


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## GBtortoises (Oct 26, 2011)

Check out www.tutlestuff.com/turtleanatomy.html for a very good "blueprint" of a tortoises internal organ placement.

It is true that the clocoa of many female tortoise species is located close to their body however, an Ibera females clocal opening is located about midway down or close to the end of the tail. Essentially the entire tail is a tube used to deliver the egg. Generally very little tail protrudes past the openingw tih this species. This can be a deceiving factor with smaller (younger) Ibera when attempting to determine their gender since at a young age the tail region of a male and female look very much alike. The eggs of mature Ibera are also considerably larger than those of other Testudo species. This might be a reason for the clocal positionbeing where it is with Ibera as compared with the other Testudo.


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## babylove6635 (Oct 26, 2011)

Jacqui said:


> babylove6635 said:
> 
> 
> > I THOUGHT FEMALES HAD SHORT FAT TAILS?
> ...


oh ok i guess thats why the girl i bought two of my torts from tought one was a female and it turned out being a male too. thank you for explaining that im learning something new every day and love it


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## DesertGrandma (Oct 26, 2011)

GBtortoises said:


> Check out www.turtlestuff.com/turtleanatomy.html for a very good "blueprint" of a tortoises internal organ placement.
> 
> It is true that the clocoa of many female tortoise species is located close to their body however, an Ibera females clocal opening is located about midway down or close to the end of the tail. Essentially the entire tail is a tube used to deliver the egg. Generally very little tail protrudes past the openingw tih this species. This can be a deceiving factor with smaller (younger) Ibera when attempting to determine their gender since at a young age the tail region of a male and female look very much alike. The eggs of mature Ibera are also considerably larger than those of other Testudo species. This might be a reason for the clocal positionbeing where it is with Ibera as compared with the other Testudo.



That is a great diagram. So we can see that the penis is stored in the body.


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## aromaff16 (Oct 28, 2011)

There is an "R" missing in the link above in the word turtle... Just in case you are wondering why the link dont work. :0P


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## Yvonne G (Oct 28, 2011)

aromaff16 said:


> There is an "R" missing in the link above in the word turtle... Just in case you are wondering why the link dont work. :0P



Thanks, Brad...I've fixed it.


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