New Baby Egyption Tortoise Care

Longhorns1187

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Hi- I am getting them from Chris Leone. He’s fantastic at answering my questions. I’m a first time Kleinmanni keeper. So, that is an important thing for me.
We are getting one this year from Chris, as well. How many are you getting?
 

Longhorns1187

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I’m getting 2...I’m hoping for a male/female pair.
You're welcome.

That's awesome. Can't wait to see how things progress with your 2 little ones. Be sure to post lots of pics! We contemplated going with 2 or 3 initially, but decided on just the one for now. Our enclosure should be finished in the next couple of weeks, so it'll be nice to have things dialed in prior to his/her arrival.
 

Salspi

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You're welcome.

That's awesome. Can't wait to see how things progress with your 2 little ones. Be sure to post lots of pics! We contemplated going with 2 or 3 initially, but decided on just the one for now. Our enclosure should be finished in the next couple of weeks, so it'll be nice to have things dialed in prior to his/her arrival.

I just finished building the actual vivarium enclosure frame. Trying to figure out the sliding doors right now. I will def post some pics. Like you I want to have it up and running so that I can dial in my temp gradient and humidity.
 

Salspi

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Yep. His name is Ra. We've had him for about 17 years now. He lives in a 600 gallon Pentair fiberglass tank with a group of 20+ spanner barbs.

Wow! Were they much easier to find 17 years ago? It’s impossible to find one.

Ra as in the Egyptian god of the Sun?
 

Longhorns1187

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Wow! Were they much easier to find 17 years ago? It’s impossible to find one.

Ra as in the Egyptian god of the Sun?
Yep. Exactly. He had a distinct sunburst pattern on his carapace when he was younger. It has since faded quite a bit with age.

Yes. They were fairly cheap back then. I think we paid $250-300 for him back in 2001. In fact, we had 3 FRT's at one point.

This is a photo of him after about 6 months in our care.received_1911168998912885.jpg
 

Salspi

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Very nice! Be careful with that FRT... I’ve heard lots of stories of people keeping them outdoors in ponds and one day they are stolen by someone. I follow this guy on YouTube and it sucks to hear how upset he was:

 

ShirleyTX

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Salspi,
The fly river was found! It crawled out of the enclosure and went back to the pond. There's a video of the day he found it, he happened to have Brian Barzyk with him.
 

TortoiseHerder

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Aug 28, 2018
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I also adopted two Egyptian Tortoises from Chris at Garden State. I’ve had them a little over a month now and they are growing like a weed. It’s funny how they both have different personalities (one is shy and one quite active). They readily take Mazuri Tortoise Food soaked in water and sprinkled with dried red clover. Here’s a photo of them and their enclosure.

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I took the sliding doors out to get the photo of their enclosure. Please let me know any suggestions you have.
 

Longhorns1187

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Cute pair of Egyptians! Our little guy doesn't have the love for Mazuri just yet. Hopefully that changes, especially with the weather getting cooler and the greens we planted will be diminishing in the upcoming weeks. We need to weigh ours again. I can definitely tell he's gotten bigger just in the month or so that we've had ours.
 

TortoiseHerder

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Cute pair of Egyptians! Our little guy doesn't have the love for Mazuri just yet. Hopefully that changes, especially with the weather getting cooler and the greens we planted will be diminishing in the upcoming weeks. We need to weigh ours again. I can definitely tell he's gotten bigger just in the month or so that we've had ours.

Mine didn’t want to eat the Mazuri either. I finally emailed Chris and asked him what he recommended and he told me to remove the other food and only offer them the Mazuri. One took to it before the other (the less shy one) but now they both eagerly eat it. I also bought a Hibiscus plant and give them the flower whenever it blooms. They like that as a snack as well.

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Longhorns1187

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Mine didn’t want to eat the Mazuri either. I finally emailed Chris and asked him what he recommended and he told me to remove the other food and only offer them the Mazuri. One took to it before the other (the less shy one) but now they both eagerly eat it. I also bought a Hibiscus plant and give them the flower whenever it blooms. They like that as a snack as well.

View attachment 249675
Oh yeah. Hibiscus flower is definitely a favorite for our little one. He really likes dandelion, clover, hibiscus and a few others. Good idea on the Mazuri. We'll have to try that one of these days. 20180818_102830.jpeg20180812_100828.jpeg20180731_132015(0).jpeg
 

TortoiseHerder

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I’m having an incredibly hard time finding dandelion or clover around where I live. Growing up it was everywhere but not everyone sprays for it I don’t see it anymore. If I do find some I’m going to put it in my terrarium with my skinks and grow it and then feed it to the tortoises on occasion.

The idea for soaking the Mazuri and adding dried herbs came from Chris in one of his videos about feeding tortoises. Here a link to the video he made:
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So our tortoises are roughly the same age. They could be siblings. When did you get yours? I got mine on July 20th.
 

Longhorns1187

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We got ours on July 25th. He was hatched on June 2nd, according to Chris. Yeah, we resorted to planting our own greens in a raised planter box in our backyard. Has worked our great, so far. That way we have a readily available supply and know it's pesticide free.
 
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