"South American Tortoises" by Vinke, Vetter, Vinke, and Vetter

[Madkins007]

"South American Tortoises"- Chelonian Library v.3
Sabine Vinke, Holger Vetter, Thomas Vinke, Susanne Vetter
2008, Edition Chimaira, originally published in Germany, 360 pages, color photos, maps, etc.
$50, zoobooksales.com http://www.zoobooksales.com/cgi-bin/catalog.cgi

This is a slick, beautiful, and well-researched book in the best tradition of the German herpetoculturalists. (In general, European reptile keepers are years ahead of Americans, and tend to base their cares on field studies, cooperative research, etc.)

This book covers the three mainland South American Tortoises- Red- and Yellow-foots and Chacos- in more depth than I have ever seen covered in one place before. Taxonomy, fossil record, in-depth descriptions, detailed habitat ranges, and more. They pull information from hundreds of sources to present a well-rounded picture of these species. Just the section discussing the history of the scientific names is longer than many tortoise care articles. 17 pages of bibliographies, 20 pages on reproduction, 42 pages on threats and conservation measures alone, for crying out loud!

Just on the first read-through, I found a lot of surprises...
- no one knows squat about Cherryheads in the wild
- no one REALLY KNOWS the full ranges of Red- or Yellow-foots in detail- lots of guesswork.
- wild Red-foots in much of their range eat a diet more like Mediterranean tortoises than we traditionally feed- grasses, hays, flowers, etc.
- Red-foots swim in the wild (which is sort of a 'duh' moment- a ground-dwelling animal in a place that rains all the time almost HAS to be comfortable in the water.)
-the biggest known Red-foot is HUGE! Wider than most are long!
- you can make a 'humidity pad' by sewing sphagnum moss in a linen bag, then soaking it, and using it in a humid hide, etc.
- some European keepers use hermit crabs and/or small lizards in their pens or tortoise enclosures to control wastes and pests

I tend to think of the price of books as value=cost/what I learn. By that formula, this book is one of the best values in my library!

(reposted and edited by the author from turtleforum.com)

 

[Stephanie Logan]

I am still poring over my Vinke and Vetter; it is one of few books that has Chaco information, and my Taco is a Chaco.

I feel it is valuable for its range as well as its depth of content. I do wish they had more information on lifespan and what illnesses Chaco's are susceptible to; also, the book says a lot of Chaco's die young in captivity but doesn't divulge the immediate causes. The lack of these details testify more to the overall shortage of Chaco research than to any culpability on the authors' part.

My only "complaint" is that I am hypersensitive to the photos that show Chaco's that are injured, dead, or in one case, spitted in preparation to be roasted alive--I had to cover some photos with my bookmark so I could read the text but avoid looking at the pictures.

 

[Madkins007]

I can't speak to Chacos, but a lot of species just plain 'fail to thrive' in captivity. Sometimes, it is just because we are missing something- a trace element in the native plants it does not get in captivity or something. When they do fail, there is often no one symptom or finding that you can pin it on.

The best example of this I can think of is koalas. If they cannot get enough eucalyptus, they die. Zoos for a long time tried hard to raise them on other, easier to find or cheaper to get foods. They matched the nutritional characteristics, etc.- but the koalas on the trial diets would just 'fail to thrive'- die from nothing special. Some abnormalities in lots of places, but nothing to point at and say 'this is the reason. If we fix this, things will be OK.'

 

[Stephanie Logan]

One of the diet issues with Chaco's that Vinke and Vetter stressed was the crucial need for prickly pear cactus, both pads and fruits. According to South American Tortoises, "In Paraguay, our Chaco Tortoises successfully reproduced only after we gave them free acess to plenty of prickly pear cactus". V & V also say of Chaco's: "in our experience, this species show signs of deficiency if their diet in captivity does not include enough prickly pear cacturs leaves...after we started keeping prickly pear leaves and fruits continuously available to our captive Chaco tortoises in Paraguay, the animals became more active, healthier, and stronger, and they began reproducing."

I asked Robyn (Crazy1) to send me some pp fruits for Taco, and then my husband picked up a couple dozen when he was at a grocery store in south Texas last night, so now I am able to feed those fruits to Taco on a regular basis (they freeze well). I will look into getting the leaves as well, but Robyn also sent me some pads that I can plant and hopefully they will grow and produce the necessary leaves!!

 

[Madkins007]

I should have re-read the Chaco stuff before I said anything- but that is a perfect example of the whole 'failure to thrive' problem.