Funny food color preference

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gtc

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I have a 5-6 month old greek called Helios. During these winter months I have been buying lots of different kinds of spring mix. He loves to eat many different kinds of leaves but I have noticed that he consistently ignores red\purple colored leaves. The weird thing is that if a leaf is both green on one end and purple-ish on the other end, he will eat up only the green part of the leaf carefully avoiding the rest. :p

Has anyone else here had their tortoise do the same?
 

mctlong

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gtc said:
I have a 5-6 month old greek called Helios. During these winter months I have been buying lots of different kinds of spring mix. He loves to eat many different kinds of leaves but I have noticed that he consistently ignores red\purple colored leaves. The weird thing is that if a leaf is both green on one end and purple-ish on the other end, he will eat up only the green part of the leaf carefully avoiding the rest. :p

Has anyone else here had their tortoise do the same?

Haha! Yes! I don't have any greeks, but none of my tortoises will touch the purple leaves (i.e. the purple parts of the red romaine lettuce leaves). My guess is that these parts of the leaves are bitter tasting.
 

tortoiselover518

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I have a russian who also only eats green leaves. I don't know why this is, but I think it's normal :)
 

MasterOogway

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It is funny. Both my guys or gals love the purple leaves . They both don't like the leaf that is green with red veins & midrib.
 

wellington

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My Leo wont eat the purple/red either. In fact he seems to stay away from red flowers too. I have tried feeding him a red cactus flower and he only wanted the pad, not the flower. Unlike a lot of torts attracted to red, mine is not.
 

Tom

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This is very common. Mine all eat the green stuff first, but by the end of the day, its all gone.
 
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