Ojai Sulcata Project, Open House

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chairman

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A couple days ago I was going to post on #4 but since the thread was moving so slow I didn't... what a difference a couple days makes!

My primary thought is that sulcata are not the animals hoarding the vegetation. The behavior sounds like that of a mammal or bird, not a tortoise, so I would assume that some animal is moving large volumes of nesting materials into sulcata burrows. Being opportunistic feeders, sulcata eat the materials when no fresh food is available. Sadly I don't know enough about African fauna to even begin to guess what animal would want to live in a sulcata burrow during the wet season but NOT be present for observers to find during the dry.

My secondary thought is that sulcata dragging vegetation into their burrows are replaying an African version of Bob and The Sprinkler. You can bet that if Bob, or any other tortoise, ever accidentally drags a tree into his shed he'll eat it too (and we'll have a great story with pictures to enjoy).

In all fairness, I am open to the idea that sulcata may actually hoard food. There may be some stimulus in the wild that signals that food will be plentiful or short. Maybe our captive sulcata use their human food gods as their personal indicators of food availability, and since we all check on our tortoises regularly, the tortoises are never triggered to attempt to hoard food.
 

Zamric

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I cant get WalkingRock to eat any kind of dry grass. The closest he will come is eating the blow from the lawnmower and only if its fresh if it sets there for a few hours and wilts.... he'll have no part of it and eat the tops of the fresh cut, live lawn.
 

BrinnANDTorts

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I don't think you can compare a flake of grass or hay ever so often to what the wild Sulcatas are doing when they are bringing in tons and tons of grasses into their burrows, layering them up to be a foot tall.
I also just don't think you can compare captive Sulcatas here in the US to the wild born and never been raised by a human being on the other side of the world in Africa, its just completely different in tons and tons of ways.
Animal instincts can leave animals that fast, if you find a baby squirrel outside in a tree you just cut down and take it in because you know the mother will never return for it now. You raise it, feed it and everything if you tried to release that squirrel back into the wild it would die.. Animal rescue people come across this problem all the time, if is extremely hard to take a captive raised animal, whether they are trying to rehabilitate because of an injury or its just been abandoned, and release it into the wild and have it survive. You would have to have very controlled conditions and mimic what it would be like in the wild to keep those animal instincts alive, even then it sometimes doesn't work.
I would never except Gupta , being raised as a hatchling by me and given everything he needed and in a cage with everything artificial and in a completely different climate and part of the world where he is originally from to show signs of a real wild Sulcata in Africa, it would shock me if he ever did lol
 

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chairman said:
A couple days ago I was going to post on #4 but since the thread was moving so slow I didn't... what a difference a couple days makes!

My primary thought is that sulcata are not the animals hoarding the vegetation.

It's been observed in the wild by Tomas on more than one occasion...so that point may be rendered moot.

What they do in captivity could be perceived as 'confusion'...for lack of a better word. Some get along with others...some don't. Some eat hay...some won't. Look at human society...the same behaviors occur here...so we need first to not give human traits to our animals...because they're NOT!;)
 

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DeanS said:
emysemys said:
But what about the flake of grass hay I give Dudley every so often. He pays no attention to it, even though his feeding is seasonal, and he has to eat the dead/dormant grass during the winter.

Yeah! But he gets in it and makes a mess of it...right? Same difference. I don't think they move it to their burrows just to eat it.

No. He'll walk up to it and give it a sniff then just walk away. It never gets disturbed at all. Its outside his house in the open.
 

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So many good points and ideas from all sides here. Love this discussion.

Jacqui's point about a reptile not forgetting its instincts that fast is a valid one, I think, but Brinn is absolutely correct about the squirrel example. I have also witnessed this with many other animals. If they don't grow up wild, they cannot survive in the wild. I've seen this with birds, mammals and reptiles. We should remember to that the vast majority of wild born tortoises do not survive at all. I have heard estimates of 300-3000 perish for every one that survives to adulthood.
 

BrinnANDTorts

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Tom said:
So many good points and ideas from all sides here. Love this discussion.

Jacqui's point about a reptile not forgetting its instincts that fast is a valid one, I think, but Brinn is absolutely correct about the squirrel example. I have also witnessed this with many other animals. If they don't grow up wild, they cannot survive in the wild. I've seen this with birds, mammals and reptiles. We should remember to that the vast majority of wild born tortoises do not survive at all. I have heard estimates of 300-3000 perish for every one that survives to adulthood.

Wow that is extreme numbers on the perishes to survives :/ How accurate do you think those are ?
 

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BrinnANDGupta said:
Tom said:
So many good points and ideas from all sides here. Love this discussion.

Jacqui's point about a reptile not forgetting its instincts that fast is a valid one, I think, but Brinn is absolutely correct about the squirrel example. I have also witnessed this with many other animals. If they don't grow up wild, they cannot survive in the wild. I've seen this with birds, mammals and reptiles. We should remember to that the vast majority of wild born tortoises do not survive at all. I have heard estimates of 300-3000 perish for every one that survives to adulthood.

Wow that is extreme numbers on the perishes to survives :/ How accurate do you think those are ?

I have no way to verify it, but knowing what I know, and considering the source is field biologists, its probably pretty close. I believe it.
 

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Parasites, predation, unfavorable weather (drought), lack of food, bad luck...
 

Zamric

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in the wild... I would say thats almost a standard survival rate for any animal that has thatlay that many eggs at once... Look at Salmon, aligators, and even Sea Turtles... it's natures way of making sure everyone gets fed and enough of everyone else has enough survivors to feed the next generation!

Figure every female of breeding age (10-110 yrs) lays 2 clutches of 15 every year... that 3000 possable children per female in the wild... with 1-10 of those surviving to adult hood.... sounds about right.
 

chairman

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DeanS said:
It's been observed in the wild by Tomas on more than one occasion...so that point may be rendered moot.

Interesting... I hope Tomas has a publication or two in the works. I'd shell out the funds for a peer reviewed journal to learn his research methods and findings.
 

cknfrmr

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Wow! Should have waited until after i did my " honey do list " to read this now i'm way behind. I think this fourm is so awesome. All this great info at my finger tips. Always new information. I bet a foot of decaying grass and a tortoise goin to the bathroom on it really smells great.
 

Zamric

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cknfrmr said:
Wow! Should have waited until after i did my " honey do list " to read this now i'm way behind. I think this fourm is so awesome. All this great info at my finger tips. Always new information. I bet a foot of decaying grass and a tortoise goin to the bathroom on it really smells great.

...and oohhhh soooo yummy!:D
 

Tom

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chairman said:
DeanS said:
It's been observed in the wild by Tomas on more than one occasion...so that point may be rendered moot.

Interesting... I hope Tomas has a publication or two in the works. I'd shell out the funds for a peer reviewed journal to learn his research methods and findings.
He is working on publishing, as a matter of fact. When they reintroduced the subadults, after overcoming huge hurdles to do so, they had installed telemetry on them. So he has been collecting distribution information since 2006. He has one publication already done, but its in French. I'm trying to get a copy and then hire a translator. He has this data, plus a whole lot more and he is currently organizing it and putting it into some sort of order with the intent of publishing a book.
 

ALDABRAMAN

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That is great! I love talking tortoises and sharing information.
 
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