Do torts travel well?

Kylee L.

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I would like to go see family over the holidays and may not have anyone to tort sit. They live 6 hours away.. I have a 1 year old Russian and was curious to know if anyone has traveled with their tortoise and what they did with then when they got to the destination.
 

Aunt Caffy

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I have a bag I made especially for my tort to travel in. It has a foam cushion at the bottom, and the insides are lined with the silver fabric used for oven mitts. There are little net pockets where I can put hand warmers (for heat) and moistened lint-free cloths for humidity. There is a little mat on the bottom so that my tort doesn’t scratch the bottom lining.

I used to carry her in a fabric lunch bag with hand warmers and moistened lint-free cloths, but she outgrew it.
 

Kylee L.

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I have a bag I made especially for my tort to travel in. It has a foam cushion at the bottom, and the insides are lined with the silver fabric used for oven mitts. There are little net pockets where I can put hand warmers (for heat) and moistened lint-free cloths for humidity. There is a little mat on the bottom so that my tort doesn’t scratch the bottom lining.

I used to carry her in a fabric lunch bag with hand warmers and moistened lint-free cloths, but she outgrew it.
I have something like that if the electricity ever goes out I can put hand warmers around it to keep him warm! thank you!
 

Tom

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I would like to go see family over the holidays and may not have anyone to tort sit. They live 6 hours away.. I have a 1 year old Russian and was curious to know if anyone has traveled with their tortoise and what they did with then when they got to the destination.
No. They don't travel well. Best to leave them at home.
 

Relic

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Do they travel well? Just wait until you get stuck behind a family of redfoots at the security checkpoint at the airport. It takes FOREVER to get them all through the metal detector, they never have all their travel documents ready for inspection, and once on the airplane not a one of them can stow their carry-on luggage in the overhead bin without assistance. It's a nightmare, I tell ya!
 

Aunt Caffy

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Do they travel well? Just wait until you get stuck behind a family of redfoots at the security checkpoint at the airport. It takes FOREVER to get them all through the metal detector, they never have all their travel documents ready for inspection, and once on the airplane not a one of them can stow their carry-on luggage in the overhead bin without assistance. It's a nightmare, I tell ya!
My redfoot Rowan has been having a devil of a time getting a proper passport photo.
 

Maggie3fan

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ok, thank you!! I really started thinking about everything I would have to bring to keep him happy and it was getting to bre a bit much
No. They don't travel well. Best to leave them at home.
I don't mean any disrespect, really, but I just drove 800 miles with a 40+lb male Sulcata. He did not poop or pee, he was in a hard rubber black tote with a fastened lid. He didn't make any sound of scratches, or banging. When I unloaded him at Y's he immediately found the first patch of grass and started grazing. I don't think he acted stressed or unhappy. I also brought my 12 yr old adopted cat who had never been on a car trip. He was fine. Great at Y's house and again on the road home. I brought back 2 box turtles, first thing I did when I got them home was set them up. They didn't act strange or nervous. I cannot be the only crazy person in the world who does not hesitate to travel with animals. I always travel with animals.
So just to please me, how do they not travel well, look? Am I so empty headed and unconscious that I don't realize how damaging I am to sensitive animals? I really want to know how you are seeing stressed out animals. I brought back 3 box turtles and one tortoise from Texas 5-6 years ago. A 2 day trip and not one of those animals acted stressed out. My cat and I did get stopped at POE and held for 8 hours while the Texas County Mounties tried to accuse me of tortoise smuggling. Ha, my cat and I were evidently trying to smuggle a common Sulcata tortoise and more common box turtles according to the police. Jerks
 

Tom

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I don't mean any disrespect, really, but I just drove 800 miles with a 40+lb male Sulcata. He did not poop or pee, he was in a hard rubber black tote with a fastened lid. He didn't make any sound of scratches, or banging. When I unloaded him at Y's he immediately found the first patch of grass and started grazing. I don't think he acted stressed or unhappy. I also brought my 12 yr old adopted cat who had never been on a car trip. He was fine. Great at Y's house and again on the road home. I brought back 2 box turtles, first thing I did when I got them home was set them up. They didn't act strange or nervous. I cannot be the only crazy person in the world who does not hesitate to travel with animals. I always travel with animals.
So just to please me, how do they not travel well, look? Am I so empty headed and unconscious that I don't realize how damaging I am to sensitive animals? I really want to know how you are seeing stressed out animals. I brought back 3 box turtles and one tortoise from Texas 5-6 years ago. A 2 day trip and not one of those animals acted stressed out. My cat and I did get stopped at POE and held for 8 hours while the Texas County Mounties tried to accuse me of tortoise smuggling. Ha, my cat and I were evidently trying to smuggle a common Sulcata tortoise and more common box turtles according to the police. Jerks
Your sample size of one is compelling, but not much stresses a 40 pound sulcata. I too travel with animals. Daily. For a living. Most tortoises release a sh** storm in their travel container. Its great that yours did not, but that is not the norm. Having had many tortoises of all sizes and species shipped, driven, and otherwise brought to me, I can tell you they don't travel well and are best left at home. Can they adapt and get used to it? Sure. Doesn't mean most people should be doing it on a regular basis.
 

Maggie3fan

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Your sample size of one is compelling, but not much stresses a 40 pound sulcata. I too travel with animals. Daily. For a living. Most tortoises release a sh** storm in their travel container. Its great that yours did not, but that is not the norm. Having had many tortoises of all sizes and species shipped, driven, and otherwise brought to me, I can tell you they don't travel well and are best left at home. Can they adapt and get used to it? Sure. Doesn't mean most people should be doing it on a regular basis.
I have been running turtles and tortoises in my Camaro back and forth to my sister's place and other places for a lot of years. You keep saying travel stresses them out, but how? Are they frothing at the mouth? Yes, I have run tortoises frequently, and the smaller animals do poop a lot. I used my recent travel with 1 Sulcata as an example. BUT...I have brought clutches of tortoises back from Calif, I rented a work van once and hauled a huge Sulcata and his 30 pounds of carrots south. I've hauled 15 to 30 small tortoises at a time. I want to know how do they act that tells you they are upset, because I don't see it.
Granted you do haul animals around for your job. OK, cool. But don't belittle my hauling experience, I don't do it in a fancy truck, but without exaggerating, I have probably run a few hundred+ chelonia. You may have hauled more, but that does not lessen my personal experience. And I don't see any signs that the animals are stressed. I don't believe they have the capacity to be stressed.
Sometimes that drive stresses ME out. I have had to stop on the road shoulder to dump out tort poop. Dangerous. But I have not seen 'stress' signs among anything I hauled and none arrived dead.
 

Markw84

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I don't mean any disrespect, really, but I just drove 800 miles with a 40+lb male Sulcata. He did not poop or pee, he was in a hard rubber black tote with a fastened lid. He didn't make any sound of scratches, or banging. When I unloaded him at Y's he immediately found the first patch of grass and started grazing. I don't think he acted stressed or unhappy. I also brought my 12 yr old adopted cat who had never been on a car trip. He was fine. Great at Y's house and again on the road home. I brought back 2 box turtles, first thing I did when I got them home was set them up. They didn't act strange or nervous. I cannot be the only crazy person in the world who does not hesitate to travel with animals. I always travel with animals.
So just to please me, how do they not travel well, look? Am I so empty headed and unconscious that I don't realize how damaging I am to sensitive animals? I really want to know how you are seeing stressed out animals. I brought back 3 box turtles and one tortoise from Texas 5-6 years ago. A 2 day trip and not one of those animals acted stressed out. My cat and I did get stopped at POE and held for 8 hours while the Texas County Mounties tried to accuse me of tortoise smuggling. Ha, my cat and I were evidently trying to smuggle a common Sulcata tortoise and more common box turtles according to the police. Jerks

Tortoises are very much creatures of routine and habit. They have very good memories in the sense that they live by programming into their memory their territority - over here is water in the rainy season. Over there that plant grows in spring. Here the grass is good. This is the place best to rest in midday. Over there is the best night hide. If you study them when you pretty much leave them to do their own thing (Don't handle and desensitize them a lot) you will start to see there is even a consistent pattern to their daily routine. My galapagos, for example has now gotten used to his newer outdoor enclosure. He pretty much comes out of the night house every day at the same time. Turns to his right and follows the same path around to the same section to graze for a while. Then goes under his favorite daytime hide in the pumpkin patch, and rests for an hour or so. Then comes out and grazes for another few hours working his way the same path to another section of the enclosure. He always checks out the stand of testudo mix in another section of the enclosure before going back into the night house for the evening.

IF they are moved, they don't know where all "their stuff" is. They live and their whole world is their relationship to "their stuff" If they cannot find it, they are stressed. Long term, low-grade stress is probably the number one killer of tortoises in captivity after dehydration.
 

Tes

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From my personal experience; when I move my tortoise in a small plastic travelbox, he gets very stressed; he pees, poops, crawls on the sides, flips over a few times. While if I move him in his enclosure (thats at least for now still possible, since his enclosure fits in the car) he's very calm and shows his normal tortoise behaviour. However, I drove max 1.5 hours with him in the car.
When I leave him at home for a longer period of time, I plant edible and easy to grow food in his enclosure, such as Cat Grass, Cress or I leave a big piece of a succulent/cactus. All those things last a few days without turning bad.
 

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