Are they Social?

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RedFootTanaka

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After having my girl/guy for a bit over 3 weeks I have been wondering if it would be better to add another redfoot to my Tanaka's enclosure. Not only would I LOVE to have another lovely redfoot around but I wonder if it would be beneficial to his/her health.

Right now I'm only worried about her health, bth mental and physical. And I'm not going to run out and get a second RF if it's only going to cause undue stress to my baby.

However the idea of breeding my sweet baby RF when he/She is old enough has me excited. So I would love the chance to get another RF for her/him to breed with.

The reason I say he/she is I think she is still too young to guess her sex. And after looking at both male and female RFs I sespect she may in fact be male despite the small tail size. I was originally hoping for a male when I rescued her from the store. But I thought she was a female when i first picked her up. Either way she was just too big for the enclosure she had there and couln't even fit in the hide they had for her. so I got her anyway so I could give her some serious TLC. But latly I've been thinking male. Especially since she cluks in her sleep allot. And she is 6 inches so maybe she is having "special" dreams.

Either way I was just wondering if an enclosure mate is beneficial to their health. I want the best for my baby. And I want another as well. But if getting another will be seen more as competition I'll opt for just the one.

Any feed back is welcome. Thanks for any input.

Josh
 

PeanutbuttER

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RedFootTanaka said:
Especially since she cluks in her sleep allot. And she is 6 inches so maybe she is having "special" dreams.

Lol, I can honestly say that I have never once thought that torts could have "special" dreams. Very funny mental image.

If you want to breed, then you could get another one and it wouldn't cause too much stress on Tanaka. They don't need a cage-mate, but redfoots do seem to play well with others. However, one thing to consider is that if Tanaka is a male, then what will happen if you randomly end up with another male? You'll have to either rehome one, seperate them, or find a couple females to get your male/female ratio set up right.
 

RedFootTanaka

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PeanutbuttER said:
RedFootTanaka said:
Especially since she cluks in her sleep allot. And she is 6 inches so maybe she is having "special" dreams.

Lol, I can honestly say that I have never once thought that torts could have "special" dreams. Very funny mental image.

If you want to breed, then you could get another one and it wouldn't cause too much stress on Tanaka. They don't need a cage-mate, but redfoots do seem to play well with others. However, one thing to consider is that if Tanaka is a male, then what will happen if you randomly end up with another male? You'll have to either rehome one, seperate them, or find a couple females to get your male/female ratio set up right.

Good Point! I think I'm going to wait at least another year until i know for sure if she is a he or not. She has a small tail but so far her plastron leads me to male.

In either case I would rather be safe than sorry so I'm going to wait untill I know his/her sex. But a male would be more fun I guess. Givven that they get much bigger than the females and have that fun hourglass shape to them.

Is 6 inches too soon to sex hem? And do you think the clucking in it's sleep is a sign of male? He/she makes noises in it's sleep that always make me laugh. It'll make a squeeking noise followed by clucking and then a short his. Then it's usually quite or he/she farts. Oh the joys of sharing a living space with a tortoise!
 

Madkins007

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If you really want to breed them, you should be thinking along the lines of at least 3, better yet 5 or more with a couple of males.

They do seem to do better in small groups but no one has ever shown that they are really bothered by being alone. If you do keep it by itself, it would probably be very helpful to make the habitat as interesting as possible- multiple hides, climbing places, plants, etc.
 
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