Another interesting article on temperature sex determination, but in Sulcatas

LeahK

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This is an older article, from 2009, so apologies if it's been posted already.

These scientists got a bunch of eggs, from a few different clutches, and tried to see if incubation temperature had any effect on metabolic rate, which it doesn't. Clutch and egg size had a much larger effect on most of the factors they tested. They also couldn't find out why the sulcatas needed temperature sex determination based on anything they tested. I was surprised to see that at either end of the temperatures they tested, they got 100% of each gender, but then again, they didn't have that many eggs to start with.

In this thread, the research team said that lower incubation temperatures cause higher growth rates in turtles, which could be why TSD exists. But in the article I just linked, specifically for sulcatas, incubation temperature had no effect on growth rate, at least up to 110 days. I am wondering how long you'd need to measure Sulcata growth rates to see a difference.

I am curious how this paper measures up to your experiences with sulcata hatchlings, or any other knowledge you have.


(As an aside, I was actually looking for more information on the temperature dependance of tortoise digestion, so if you know any, send them my way!)
 

LeahK

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Or, I guess since temperature incubations often don't give you the gender you want, do you find that male-incubated females are bigger or that female-incubated males are smaller?
 
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