Is there a correlation between hatchling growth/adult size?

lionheartHC

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I've been monitoring my hatchling closely and he's growing quick! I see some posts on here that have some rather large one year old Sulcatas and some very small. Is it safe to say that if my hatchling is gaining weight steadily that he'll continue to do so? Or is there a chance he can plateau at any time?
 

Tim Carlisle

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Steady growth is indicative of a healthy tort for the most part. Each tort will grow at its own pace. Don't try to compare yours with others. It'll drive you crazy lol. You will experience peaks, valleys, and plateaus as well. Do you keep a growth chart? If not, might be a good idea. I've been measuring weight on a weekly basis, and shell length (SCL) on a monthly basis. It's fun to chart!
 

lionheartHC

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Steady growth is indicative of a healthy tort for the most part. Each tort will grow at its own pace. Don't try to compare yours with others. It'll drive you crazy lol. You will experience peaks, valleys, and plateaus as well. Do you keep a growth chart? If not, might be a good idea. I've been measuring weight on a weekly basis, and shell length (SCL) on a monthly basis. It's fun to chart!


This might sound obsessive but I weigh mine daily! lol some days he can make a ~4 gram jump which I thought was crazy. I’m logging everything through this journey. :) I actually wasn’t measuring shell length but I’m going to do that too!
 

Tim Carlisle

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This might sound obsessive but I weigh mine daily! lol some days he can make a ~4 gram jump which I thought was crazy. I’m logging everything through this journey. :) I actually wasn’t measuring shell length but I’m going to do that too!
Daily? Wow - I thought I was obsessive. lol
 

Mystic_Queen (Llaria)

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I was told a cool fun way measuring shell by one of the well known members.
gently draw around the torts shell. And date it. Do it once a month.
then you can over lap them and see the difference as months go by.
im going to be doing this for about 6 months to a year.
My redfoots 4 months old. So a lot of growth to do. After 6 months or so I’ll over lap them and pop in a 3D frame.
I did first one other day on tracing paper (white tracing paper). I chose tracing paper so when I come to put them all in a frame I can get some of the tiny LED lights to go behind it when when it’s hung and lights are on I can see the growth.
 

lionheartHC

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Probably, no definitely, obsessive but I do the same thing haha. My little guy fluctuates a couple by of grams daily, up and down, but has shown steady average growth. He weighed in at 42.9g in Jan and now he's up to 70g!

Woah! I got mine July 6th at 35 grams and today he’s 54 grams! Maybe he is growing quicker than I realized lol.
 

lionheartHC

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Location (City and/or State)
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I was told a cool fun way measuring shell by one of the well known members.
gently draw around the torts shell. And date it. Do it once a month.
then you can over lap them and see the difference as months go by.
im going to be doing this for about 6 months to a year.
My redfoots 4 months old. So a lot of growth to do. After 6 months or so I’ll over lap them and pop in a 3D frame.
I did first one other day on tracing paper (white tracing paper). I chose tracing paper so when I come to put them all in a frame I can get some of the tiny LED lights to go behind it when when it’s hung and lights are on I can see the growth.

This is such a cool idea! Thank you so much for taking the time to share. :)
 

lionheartHC

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I’ve only had my little pumpkin a week. So still learning all the ropes in red foot care. But the idea about the shell outline I think is awesome. And would make a very nice piece of frame work.
For sure! My office is covered in art and I've already got some cool ideas to do! :)
 
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Woah! I got mine July 6th at 35 grams and today he’s 54 grams! Maybe he is growing quicker than I realized lol.
As long as his weight is going up and not down! I shoot for feeding my dude about 5% of his body weight in food per day (I soak pellets before weighing them). I don't know if that is a good percentage or not but he's gaining weight so I think it's good.
 

Krista S

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Something I do, is once per week when I weigh my tortoise, I take a picture of him on the scale. I’ve got some markings set up so that the picture is taken from roughly the same distance each time. I wish I would have thought to do this right away when I got him, but better late than never. I started this when he was almost 6 months old at 49 grams and he is now 1 year and 3 months old weighing around 210 grams. I often refer back to these pictures and they’re some of my favourites. It’s fun to see the growth in pictures.
 

Tom

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I've been monitoring my hatchling closely and he's growing quick! I see some posts on here that have some rather large one year old Sulcatas and some very small. Is it safe to say that if my hatchling is gaining weight steadily that he'll continue to do so? Or is there a chance he can plateau at any time?
I've seen this go both ways. I've seen slow starters speed way up, and I've seen fast starters slow way down.

Having them outside a lot, or moving them outside full time, will slow them way down, even when they were growing like crazy as a baby. It can really go either way.
 

Davide.bach

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[TE="ParkourMexican, post: 1852982, member: 117704"]
Probably, no definitely, obsessive but I do the same thing haha. My little guy fluctuates a couple by of grams daily, up and down, but has shown steady average growth. He weighed in at 42.9g in Jan and now he's up to 70g!
[/QUOTE]
hi! mine is 190 gr today…… April was 49...…!!! ;)
 

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