2010 South African Leopard Thread.

[diamondbp]

@Tom this was your original quote to TFO back in March of 2010..........where it ALL BEGAN! lol I thought it was worth sharing

"I haven't heard much mention of "the other" leopard tortoise here. Is anyone breeding Geochelone pardalis pardalis? Or does anyone know of a breeder in Southern CA? I'd like to get a couple of hatchlings."

^^^Now you are the Pardalis Pardalis sensei^^^ lol

 

[Tom]

@Tom this was your original quote to TFO back in March of 2010..........where it ALL BEGAN! lol I thought it was worth sharing

"I haven't heard much mention of "the other" leopard tortoise here. Is anyone breeding Geochelone pardalis pardalis? Or does anyone know of a breeder in Southern CA? I'd like to get a couple of hatchlings."

^^^Now you are the Pardalis Pardalis sensei^^^ lol

HA! That just goes to show how much experience I DON'T have!!!

I may have learned a few things along this way, but I have SOOOOOOOO much more yet to learn. I can't be truly considered a Gpp "sensei" until I have babies out of babies that I've produced.

I will arrive there in good time "grass hoppa".

 

[diamondbp]

@Yvonne G have you candled your p.p. eggs yet?

 

[Lincoln Michal]

Tom, Yvonne, I have been looking at a lot of pardalis pardalis images and your adults are really nice. The pictures of the juveniles are distictive. They look very different from babcocki. They seem flatter and their skin is darker and speckled and double spots. Some of the images of pardalis pardalis hatchlings advertised seem rounder and lack the two spots. What do you think?

 

[Tom]

Lots of people have asked for current pics and an update. Here we go:
Mr. Blue is now 25.4 pounds and 17.5" long. He lives with Hamburger, V-Neck and another younger female that I hatched myself.


V-Neck is also 25.4 pounds and 17" long:


Hamburger is named for her shape. She is 19.4 pounds and 15" long:


In the next enclosure is Mr. Green. He is now 25.6 pounds and he lives with Crooked Scute and another unrelated older South African female. He and Mr. Blue are darn near twins in every way. If they lost their color dots and someone switched them, I might not even notice. They both sprint toward me and bite or ram me to get me out of their territory. Its like those dogs that go crazy when they sense the approach of the mail man.


Crooked Scute is 22.4 pounds and 16":


I neglected to get a pic of Big Boy. He was my fastest grower as a young lad, but the others have outgrown him now. He is also territorial, but not as bad as Mr. Blue and Mr. Green. He is the one that had the split scutes in front. He weighs 16.6 pounds at 15" long. He lives alone as my surplus male. I owe you guys a pic as he's the smoothest of all of them, and quite attractive.

That is all six of my original 2010 leopards. Hope you like them. I sure do.

 

[Tom]

One more thing… Here is what all the girls have been up to all summer long:




I get another clutch of 10-15 eggs from each one about every four weeks. Just dug up 10 more eggs from Hamburger 2 days ago. I've got about 80-90 eggs now. I did the whole cooling period thing and the first two clutches went into the incubator on 7-5-16. If they are fertile and I did everything right, we should see their first babies mid-October. Fingers crossed...

 

[Tom]

Hey guys! Scroll up ^.

@Yvonne G
@diamondbp
@Neal
@wellington
@Moozillion
@Abramsmytankturtle
@WhitneyO
@Eragon
@MichaelS
@Lincoln Michal

I know there were others that asked for an update and photos, but these are all I can come up with at the moment… Please share with anyone who might be interested.

 

[wellington]

Very cool. Been wondering when it was all going to start happening again. Congrats. Fingers crossed they are all good ones. If they are, I'd love to see a pic when they all are running around. In different directions of course

 

[jim taylor]

One more thing… Here is what all the girls have been up to all summer long:
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I get another clutch of 10-15 eggs from each one about every four weeks. Just dug up 10 more eggs from Hamburger 2 days ago. I've got about 80-90 eggs now. I did the whole cooling period thing and the first two clutches went into the incubator on 7-5-16. If they are fertile and I did everything right, we should see their first babies mid-October. Fingers crossed...

What is the purpose of the cooling down period? I tried to look it up and see the various threads talking about what to use. But I don't see the reason why it is done. Just curious as to what the reason why and what it does for the egg.

 

[diamondbp]

@Tom you do know you've made my month with this update?!? Lol . No lie I was just thinking yesterday that I wanted to find this thread and ask for an update.

First , thanks for taking the time to post the photos and info. These are all things I and others look forward to. So I hope you don't mind but I'm curious about a few things?

1. How consistent is the mating activity? I ask because my pp male was a mating machine last year but I have yet to see him mount any female once this whole year.

2. What was the largest and smallest clutch so far?

3. Are you leaving any clutches in the ground?

I do find it interesting that your males are that aggressive. My male has never once displayed that kind of aggression. Vneck has quite an interesting shape!

@Yvonne did you have any luck with fertile eggs and incubation ?

It looks like even more of my young "hopeful" females are now turning male on me. I only have 3 confirmed females and was hoping for 7 or more . But it looks like you're getting plenty of eggs with your handful of females .

So thanks again. I look forward to any additional info and pictures you will share in the future.

 

[Tom]

What is the purpose of the cooling down period? I tried to look it up and see the various threads talking about what to use. But I don't see the reason why it is done. Just curious as to what the reason why and what it does for the egg.

I know of at least a couple of species, these and platynota, whose eggs go through a diapause. This is a delay or suspension of embryonic development until the egg is cycled through the correct temperatures. Their eggs will not develop unless you cool them to about 60 degrees. There is a whole two month long "recipe" for it. In the wild these guys go through a winter. If the eggs hatch at the wrong time of year, the babies won't survive. So it doesn't matter when they lay their eggs in the wild, all the eggs in the groung start to incubate and develop at the same time, so that they hatch at the right time. Mine lay during the hot months. Doesn't matter whether they lay those eggs in March or October, or anytime in-between, all the eggs will sit in the ground doing nothing until after the winter cool down and then when the ground warms up in spring, they all begin to incubate. They guy we all got these leopards from leaves them in the ground to do their own thing. He says it can be 12-18 months of the eggs sitting in the ground before they hatch. His all hatch in September. So if a female lays in September of 2016, those eggs won't start to develop until summer of 2017 and they will hatch in September. If a female lays eggs at his place in March of 2016, those egg will sit in the ground and not develop until the summer of 2017 too, because they must go through a winter cooling period before they can incubate and hatch. Even though summer of 2016 will be hot enough and long enough to incubate, those March 2016 eggs must have their winter cool down before they will develop.

Did I explain that right? Make sense?

 

[Tom]

@Tom you do know you've made my month with this update?!? Lol . No lie I was just thinking yesterday that I wanted to find this thread and ask for an update.

First , thanks for taking the time to post the photos and info. These are all things I and others look forward to. So I hope you don't mind but I'm curious about a few things?

1. How consistent is the mating activity? I ask because my pp male was a mating machine last year but I have yet to see him mount any female once this whole year.

2. What was the largest and smallest clutch so far?

3. Are you leaving any clutches in the ground?

I do find it interesting that your males are that aggressive. My male has never once displayed that kind of aggression. Vneck has quite an interesting shape!

1. I put the males in with them in early Spring and breeding began immediately and hasn't stopped. Those two boys are very aggressive. I'm considering housing them alone over winter to give the girls some peace and quiet.
2. The first clutches were 8, 8, and 6 from little hamburger. Second clutches were 10, 10 and 12. Third clutched were 10, 12 and 15. I'm told 15 is a pretty high number. 6-10 is normal for my friend who has some large older females, but his eggs are heavier than mine. Fourth clutches were 10, 12 and 12. I couldn't be more thrilled for their first year. I anticipated a slow start for the first couple of years at least, but I've had the opposite. I hope I have reasonably good fertility… Time will tell.
3. Not leaving any clutches in the ground yet. I'm following my buddies recipe and I'll see what I get. If hatch rates are dismal, I might try some clutches in the ground next year, but I'll still incubate some, because the low hatch rates could be due to first year moms and dads.

 

[Tom]

I do find it interesting that your males are that aggressive. My male has never once displayed that kind of aggression. Vneck has quite an interesting shape!

I saw signs of this early on when they were only 1.5 years old and 4-5" long. That is when I had to separate the males and females. The males were always pushing and shoving and humping, but all still growing and thriving together. Once they got to about 3 years old and 8", I had to separate all the males into individual enclosures, because the fighting got too serious and too frequent. There would battle-royales going on in the pen with 5 or 6 males all brawling each other at the same time. If you look at Mr. Blue and Mr. Green's pics you can still see the mounting scuff marks they gave each other as juveniles. Usually you only see these scuffs on adult females.

The only other tortoises that I've seen behave this way are those rare super male Testudo. In my lifetime, I've seen a few greek and russian males that were hyper-aggressive and super territorial. These "super males" wanted to fight anything in or near their territory.

This is just one reason why I continually assert that these tortoises are NOT like other leopards.

 

[Tom]

It looks like even more of my young "hopeful" females are now turning male on me. I only have 3 confirmed females and was hoping for 7 or more . But it looks like you're getting plenty of eggs with your handful of females .

I did the same thing. I held back 12 of the original 36 from 2010 and 9 of the 12 turned out male. I was surprised by this because Randy told me males were very rare and highly sought after. I sold two of the 36 to Yvonne and hers turned out to be one male and one female.

 

[MichaelS]

Excellent update Tom. I LOVE your posts and insight that you share. You have some interesting shaped carapaces on your ladies.

I'll echo Byron's observations on the male aggression thing. I have one confirmed male and another 99% male that hatched 2014 and neither are showing signs of aggression towards me or any other tort. Only my super grower, now over 10 inches, mounts and even that is pretty tame... no biting just a subtle climb on to the back and some grunting. I sure hope that some of the eggs cooking turn out to be female. I think I'm following suit so far with a mostly male group of my own

 

[Gillian M]

I recieved mine on October 29. I live in Ohio so he won't get any outside time until next spring.

Oh..........he's so sweet!

 

[Neal]

Good update. Funny that most turned out to be male, that's how my group turned out. I was lucky enough to hang on to 1.2.

 

[klawran1]

The only other tortoises that I've seen behave this way are those rare super male Testudo. In my lifetime, I've seen a few greek and russian males that were hyper-aggressive and super territorial. These "super males" wanted to fight anything in or near their territory.

My Russian is VERY territorial. He will go after anything, including me. He has learned that biting my shoe does nothing so he will try to climb my shoe to reach the skin on my ankle. He's never been around another female close to his size (just my lady Leopard when they were out grazing). I will say he has taken full advantage of a rock that was in his old enclosure. I think he was heart broken when we moved and the rock got thrown out.... Haha. SO glad you did an update!

 

[navyblu]

I did the same thing. I held back 12 of the original 36 from 2010 and 9 of the 12 turned out male. I was surprised by this because Randy told me males were very rare and highly sought after. I sold two of the 36 to Yvonne and hers turned out to be one male and one female.

Hey Tom, just thought you'd like to see Luke, the male I bought from you 3 years ago and part of your 2010 group....17.5" and 27lbs!!

 

[Zamric]

VERY KOOL! I forgot that Eros and Gaia have always been small for their ages..... Your guys are gorgouse! I know they are a different spieces than mine but so big!.

Do they need a special mix of soil to lay their eggs?