More questions

[Amanda81]

I have to decide what or I guess I should say who I want to keep and who I will have to part with soon.
I plan on getting an Aldabra after the first of the year and I am trying to decide what I'm going to do. I need some advise on my leopards before I make a decision.
1) can you house the "regular" leopards with the SA leopards?
2) of course I know it's suggestion that just 1 is best, but if you are going to have multiple leopards, can you house as many together as you have space for?

 

[wellington]

Its not really recommended to cross the two subspecies, if they breed you will get of course a mixture of the two. I wouldn't do it, but it's seems to be that a lot of our leopards are mixed anyway. Second, if you are worrying about having room for your leopards, how do you have room for an Aldabra?
As for housing as many together as you have room for. Hmm, it depends on the actual size and the site barriers. If you have more then one male together, you may have lots of horrible fighting going on. So, they should be separated into their own Little group of 2-3 females to 1 male.

 

[Tom]

1) can you house the "regular" leopards with the SA leopards?
2) of course I know it's suggestion that just 1 is best, but if you are going to have multiple leopards, can you house as many together as you have space for?

1. You shouldn't. They really are not compatible behavior wise and you don't want them interbreeding when they get older.
2. Regular leopards usually do fine in mixed groups. South Africans usually need to have just one mature male per group. So the answer to this question depends on what sex ratios you end up with.

 

[Amanda81]

Its not really recommended to cross the two subspecies, if they breed you will get of course a mixture of the two. I wouldn't do it, but it's seems to be that a lot of our leopards are mixed anyway. Second, if you are worrying about having room for your leopards, how do you have room for an Aldabra?
As for housing as many together as you have room for. Hmm, it depends on the actual size and the site barriers. If you have more then one male together, you may have lots of horrible fighting going on. So, they should be separated into their own Little group of 2-3 females to 1 male.

I'm not concerned with the amount of room I have, that's not the issue. I have about 5 acres that I can house them on here and if I move south in a year or two I will make sure I have close to the same amount of space as well.
I have some "regular" leopards now and would like to get some "pure" SA leopards. I was just wanting to know how I could group them. I guess I worded it wrong. I would seperate the 2 once they got to breeding size so I'm not mixing the 2 types. I would really rather no one be breeding at all so I would might just house my females together and my males have their own individual space. Can you house 3-4 females together without a male?

 

[Amanda81]

Now I have a another question.....
I got 3, Ivory, Duke, and Dent, leopards hatchlings from a person around first of august. He was not the breeder, he bought them from the breeder to sale, so I'm not sure how they were started or anything before I got them. When I first got them they were all about the same size, Ivory and Duke had a small amount of "white" coming in on their shells, Dent did not.
Ivory is on the left and Duke on the right, you can see the little amount of white.

Me Dent is the middle one. As you can see, their all about the same size.
So over the last 2 months Ivory and Duke have grown and they both have more white on their shells.

This is Ivory. Lots more white and her shell is very nice and smooth.

Ivory again in a 4" saucer for size comparison.

This is Duke. Again more white and a smooth shell. I have also noticed that he is getting a real "dome" shell. (This is his normal position anytime he thinks you are going to touch him)

Duke in 4" saucer too

This Dent. You can see he finally has a very small amount of white starting to show.

Dent in a 4" saucer. According to measurements he has grow 1/4" and gained 8grams in the 2 months I have had him. (His personality head really grown, he really has the best personality of all my leopards)
His shell seems to be more lumpy then the other two as well. ( looking down at him, his first scute on right is sunk in, he was like that when I got him, that's y we call him Dent) When I first got them all their shells looked a little rough, they got held over in Memphis over nite and I figured maybe they were a little dry, figured couple days of soaks would fix that and over time the other two has smoothed out and looks really nice but his continues to be lumpy and dry looking. Their kept in the same enclosure, I make sure everyone sleeps in their humid hide, they get the same things to eat and Dent usually eats more then the other 2 do. They all soak the same amount of time, their poos all seem ok.
So my question is,
1) is it possible that Duke and Ivory might be older then Dent?
2) do you think they might be dry start baby's since they were kinda rough looking when I got them?
3) do you think I need to do something extra for Dent? More supplements? More soaks? Anything?

This is the pic of Ivory the seller had

Pic seller had of Duke. (Notice he is in his "god someone might touch me" position, lol)

This is pic seller had of Dent.
Now I noticed the substrate, when I asked if that's what they lived on he said no, that this pic was took when he picked them up from breeder. They was in a transport bin (The original pic was of like 50 hatchlings in a tub, I cropped my individual torts out of original pic.)

 

[Maggie Cummings]

They look too dry to me. But I don't have Leo's. I would separate Dent from the others as he is getting bullied. That's why he's smaller.
If you have so many acres you start building tort pens first. You have enough room to separate your leopard species and keep any Aldabs away. You have enough room to put 2 or 3 together but most males will want to be alone. Tortoises are not groupies, they are not social; they are solitary beings. I would put as many alone as I could. And with the exception of 3 female box turtles, everybody I have is kept alone...
your babies are too little to be outside for more then a few minutes now, so what's the hurry? But seriously, separate out Dent, it will be better for him...

 

[Yvonne G]

Hi:

I have had leopard tortoises for many years. I used to get them frequently as rescues, and subsequently had a herd of 2.4. The males got along just fine, but they lived in a large outdoor yard, sharing an insulated shed at night.

Over time, I adopted out the males and only kept two females. It was hard to sell the babies and I ended up giving them away. So, no more breeding for me. Well, I kept the first leopard egg that I ever hatched, and, wouldn't you know it...it's a male. So I now have 1.2 babcock leopards.

Then 4 years ago I bought two SA leopards from Tom and last year I bought another SA leopard from Ben Awes. So I now have 1.1.1 SA leopards. The 2010 SA leopards are big enough to live in the big tortoise yard, and I've had the babcocks and SA's together until this year. The SA's are much more - not really aggressive, that's really not the right word, but I guess you would call it more outgoing. At only 4 years of age the male SA leopard is already bigger than my 6 yr old babcock and he has bullied him so much that the male babcock stays hiding in a corner all the time.

Right now I have them separated male/female, but when the SA female gets big enough to pass eggs, I'll separate them babcock/SA. I really need three yards at this time so I can have the males separate from each other and the females in their own yard. This problem will resolve itself once I'm able to put the SA female in the same yard as the SA male (I have a very young YF tortoise that becomes egg bound at least once a year because she's too small to pass the eggs easily, so I don't want the female SA leopard to be in this same boat).

So, in my opinion, because of the difference in nature between the babcocks and the SA leopards, I would not keep them together if I were you.

 

[Amanda81]

They look too dry to me. But I don't have Leo's. I would separate Dent from the others as he is getting bullied. That's why he's smaller.
If you have so many acres you start building tort pens first. You have enough room to separate your leopard species and keep any Aldabs away. You have enough room to put 2 or 3 together but most males will want to be alone. Tortoises are not groupies, they are not social; they are solitary beings. I would put as many alone as I could. And with the exception of 3 female box turtles, everybody I have is kept alone...
your babies are too little to be outside for more then a few minutes now, so what's the hurry? But seriously, separate out Dent, it will be better for him...

I have plans on sectioning those acres off into "areas" for each species as soon as we finish clearing it. Right now it's a hot mess of woods. We are in the process of clearing out all the under brush and pretty much anything between the ground and 8' up. I plan on my enclosures being that tall and I want wire tops so I know nothing can get in the enclosure. Then after all that stuff is out of the way I'm going to clear out most of the existing trees, one so more sunlight can get into the area and two I want to plant some mulberry trees I have started. I also plan on growing grape vines up one Side of each enclosure. I am creating a "cactus hill" too. I can't wait, I will have a "tort plantation" when I'm done. Lol.
But it will be a good long while before my little ones go out. I watch them to see if I see signs that one is picking on another one and I haven't seen anything. No one is fighting, no one is staring another one down, Duke and Ivory really don't do much at all. They come out their hide, eat and usually go back to their hide and sleep till they want to eat again. Dent is usually the one that's all over the place. He eats better then any of them, he is more active then both of them combine. I will seperate him if that's what he needs.

 

[Tom]

Can you house 3-4 females together without a male?

Yes. Should be no problem for either type. But I would still keep the two types separate because as I said, they are not behaviorally compatible, and even thought they are the same species, they come from very different environments.

 

[Amanda81]

Hi:

I have had leopard tortoises for many years. I used to get them frequently as rescues, and subsequently had a herd of 2.4. The males got along just fine, but they lived in a large outdoor yard, sharing an insulated shed at night.

Over time, I adopted out the males and only kept two females. It was hard to sell the babies and I ended up giving them away. So, no more breeding for me. Well, I kept the first leopard egg that I ever hatched, and, wouldn't you know it...it's a male. So I now have 1.2 babcock leopards.

Then 4 years ago I bought two SA leopards from Tom and last year I bought another SA leopard from Ben Awes. So I now have 1.1.1 SA leopards. The 2010 SA leopards are big enough to live in the big tortoise yard, and I've had the babcocks and SA's together until this year. The SA's are much more - not really aggressive, that's really not the right word, but I guess you would call it more outgoing. At only 4 years of age the male SA leopard is already bigger than my 6 yr old babcock and he has bullied him so much that the male babcock stays hiding in a corner all the time.

Right now I have them separated male/female, but when the SA female gets big enough to pass eggs, I'll separate them babcock/SA. I really need three yards at this time so I can have the males separate from each other and the females in their own yard. This problem will resolve itself once I'm able to put the SA female in the same yard as the SA male (I have a very young YF tortoise that becomes egg bound at least once a year because she's too small to pass the eggs easily, so I don't want the female SA leopard to be in this same boat).

So, in my opinion, because of the difference in nature between the babcocks and the SA leopards, I would not keep them together if I were you.

I am thinking I should have a area for my female SA, an area for my female babcocki, and then each of my males have their own area. That's probably the safest way to go. I really rather not have anyone breeding anyhow, I probably wouldn't be able to part w the baby's and that's not really my goal.
Perhaps it would be best to to thin down to one of each before they get to adulthood. Around what age or size do they start maturing and picking on each other?

 

[Yvonne G]

Like I said, my SA male is 4 and my babcocki male is 6.

 

[Tom]

Around what age or size do they start maturing and picking on each other?

My male SA leopards all started pushing, shoving and mounting by about 18-24 months old.

There does not have to be overt obvious aggression, for there to be a problem with keeping them together. Just the bullish personality of one type of tortoise can be very off-putting to a less boisterous type.

 

[Amanda81]

My male SA leopards all started pushing, shoving and mounting by about 18-24 months old.

There does not have to be overt obvious aggression, for there to be a problem with keeping them together. Just the bullish personality of one type of tortoise can be very off-putting to a less boisterous species.

What about w the baby's? Like I don't see Ivory or Duke bully Dent, no physical contact at all, they all 3 will eat together and I don't see any of them being pushy or more dominate with another, but could that be the explanation why Dent is so much smaller and isn't growing like the other 2? Their typical day is wake up, soak, eat together, Ivory and Duke go back to their hide, and Dent will usually go get under his fake plant. They will periodically come back to eat more throughout the day and go back to hide. Dent is really the more active one of the 3. The 2 that I had die, the breeder sent me 2 more, they are around 30 days old, they have the freckling just like the other two did but their personality is more shy, they suck in their shells if you come near, but Dent is more their size.

 

[Tom]

It does not sound to me like you have a compatibility issue right now. It would be unusual for a group of baby regular leopards to have that sort of issue. The regular leopards often do fine even as adults together with more than one male. Not always, but more often than not they don't fight.

As far as the growth issues, that is anyone's guess. If it had a dry start, that would be the most obvious best guess from me.

 

[Amanda81]

Just as a personal opinion, from someone that's raised multiple species, both ways, do you think it's easier to have just one of a species or multiples? For example, I'm wanting to have, end up with the following species, an Aldabra, a SA leopard and a regular leopard. As for raising and having mature adult tortoises, this is what I would like to have. Rather it's 1 of each or 20 oWould one of each be better, when it comes to time and effort or is it a "i have 1, what's one more?" Type of thing.

 

[Yvonne G]

Well, since tortoises are solitary animals, who have a territory, and don't like other tortoises in their territory, in my opinion, having just one tortoise per species would not be a problem.

 

[Levi the Leopard]

Most of us keep tortoises in groups for OUR convenience, not theirs.
In all I've gone through, I've always seen the solitary tortoises do best.

 

[Amanda81]

Most of us keep tortoises in groups for OUR convenience, not theirs.
In all I've gone through, I've always seen the solitary tortoises do best.

Well I am going to have to think about something's. I do want what's best for them. Do you think they are more active when their live alone?

 

[J.P.]

i'm a total noob but reading the facts about dent, maybe he's smaller because he hides less? ivory and duke could be benefiting more from the added humidity in the hide. it's just the only obvious variable i can see in this case, other than that it could be anything.

 

[Alaskamike]

I suspect that even if you raised an entire clutch together to adulthood, maintaining as much as possible the same environment you would see growth differences. This is just genetic. It is also modified by behavioral issues; how much do they eat , drink, sleep, roam, etc.

Theoretically , a female could have a clutch with eggs fertilized by more than one male - even more variability.

I think if the babies are active and eating / eliminating / drinking well - they are probably just showing these variations.

Some grow slower , but as adults turn out even larger than their faster growing ( as baby's) siblings.