I realize that I am not an expert, however, I HAVE "headstarted" several hundred Sulcata hatchlings for their first year. I did the same thing when my sister had Gopherus agassizii dumped on her, I headstarted several hundred of them also. I did live in Calif then. Also that was before the 'net, so we didn't know stuff then like we do now. I will repeat, I am not any expert, but I did have these great groups of hatchlings. Actually, creeps of tortoises.
So while there were a very few deaths, we still raised some nice babies.
@Tom
But you have declared these very same water dishes that I used for freakin years without a problem "death traps"? Was I just lucky that nobody drowned? What is so bad about them? Can't have been that many deaths, as even tho you say they are bad, most other keepers simply parrot your words. Did we have an epidemic of drownings and somehow I didn't hear about these deaths?
Your quote...
Those water bowls are great for snakes and lizards, but they are literally death traps for tortoises. You need to remove that ASAP and replace it with a terra cotta saucer sunk into the substrate.
So there's my question, why are they bad? Saucers have straight sides, that makes them better? It's not a life threatening thing with me, I'm just curious
So while there were a very few deaths, we still raised some nice babies.
@Tom
But you have declared these very same water dishes that I used for freakin years without a problem "death traps"? Was I just lucky that nobody drowned? What is so bad about them? Can't have been that many deaths, as even tho you say they are bad, most other keepers simply parrot your words. Did we have an epidemic of drownings and somehow I didn't hear about these deaths?
Your quote...
Those water bowls are great for snakes and lizards, but they are literally death traps for tortoises. You need to remove that ASAP and replace it with a terra cotta saucer sunk into the substrate.
So there's my question, why are they bad? Saucers have straight sides, that makes them better? It's not a life threatening thing with me, I'm just curious