Tom's response to "Garden State Tortoise" Video

[Littleredfootbigredheart]

Why would coir or bark have any less chance for build up?

I imagine sand having a mushy cement like consistency that would be easier to combine together in the gut vs bark or coir, I’m sure it’s not an issue for some but definitely has been for others regardless of the reasoning behind it🫤

 

[S2G]

I imagine sand having a mushy cement like consistency that would be easier to combine together in the gut vs bark or coir, I’m sure it’s not an issue for some but definitely has been for others regardless of the reasoning behind it🫤

We got snacks & a comfy chair...

Theyve evolved for sand. How many have evolved for bark & coir?

 

[S2G]

Why would coir or bark have any less chance for build up?

Because one guy says so...

 

[Littleredfootbigredheart]

They’ve evolved for sand. How many have evolved for bark & coir?

I’m not saying they’ve evolved to be on bark&coir anymore than they’ve evolved be on sand in a captive environment, I just see one with unnecessary risks when looking at the bigger picture of care as a whole, that outweigh the benefits it can provide in captivity.

Because one guy says so...

We have definitely seen from some of the posts shared, sand has been an issue for some captive tortoises, not necessarily the cause of death(we can’t know for sure) but an issue nevertheless.. whether that was exacerbated but other issues with care or illness, that doesn’t matter to me when it’s just simpler to avoid being an added problem altogether I guess🫤

 

[wellington]

Why would coir or bark have any less chance for build up?

I don't have proof they don't but I don't remember ever hearing/reading about coir being an impaction. I do remember some tortoises having swallowed chips, but I don't believe there has been an impaction reported. My opinion is the coir seems like it would be harder to swallow, where I know sand isn't, as I have had many times sand in my own mouth, beach sand that is and it was hard to get rid of it and it wasn't a lot, just blowing sand or when someone shakes their towel in your face or runs by kicking up sand. But I have not had coir in my mouth, so can't say how hard that would be to remove. Wood chips would be harder to swallow and likely spit out once they realized it wasn't food, I would think.
I always preferred the coir for little ones and I use chips for the winter enclosures and natural ground in summer.

 

[Tom]

I really dont understand why my point is so hard to grasp. If you keep them natural, feed them a natural diet, feed them in a common sense natural way, & provide hydration its an absolute non issue. Theyre 100% designed for that soil type & will seek what they want if YOU provide them with different area's.

Because your point is wrong. Some of the cases of sand impaction are in animals that meet the criteria you just laid out. YOU mistakenly think it is a non-issue and you are wrong. Dead wrong. You just don't realize it.

And here we go again with offering tortoises choices... Another good way to kill them. Are you going to now tell us that its fine to use foreign toxic plants because tortoises have survived for millions of years without our help and you think they know what to eat and what not to eat? How about letting the tortoise choose where it sleeps at night when temps will drop to near freezing after an 80 degree sunny day. They know what's best for themselves, right?

Gardenstate works if you keep them like they do.

NO IT DOESN'T! Why can't you get this through your thick skull? It works SOME OF THE TIME, not all fo the time as you are implying. You have deciding in your own head that you know what causes sand impaction and what doesn't and you are WRONG. This right here is the reason we have been arguing all this time! Its because you think you know what is going on and you don't.

 

[Tom]

my box turtle pen has been established for easily 25yrs...... it used to be a 24' above ground pool, it became a 24x24 square pen...... you know what's put under a pool liner? SAND.... i rototilled it into the soil........ i added some extra bags of sand to where they would hibernate, dug and rototilled this area down easily 2'...... my house was built in/on a vineyard, to give you an idea of the already existing soil........ there are, at last count, 17 box turtles in that pen, wasn't always that many..... i'll guess conservatively over the last 25yrs there has been an average of 6 in that pen....... would that be equivalent to having kept one box turtle on that sandy soil for 150yrs without issue.......

Its lovely that YOU have not experienced any sand impaction problems. Wonderful. I'm really glad about that. What you fail to recognize is that other people DO have sand impaction problems from housing tortoises on sandy substrates.

No one is telling you that you have had sand impaction problems. Its not about you and your turtles.

 

[Tom]

I guess we're going to skip over the fact Chris says when used "correctly". The same with that coil bulb. If you dont want to do it like that then do something else. Very simple concept.

Chris successfully does it this way follow that method. Tom successfully does it this way follow this method.

I'm not skipping it. The post that started this thread specifically addresses both of these issues. The problem here is that both coil bulbs and sand sometimes harm tortoises. My way doesn't.

 

[Tom]

the "wild" can be duplicated good enough easier than you think...

SOOOOOO many tortoises die this way. Think of all the dead baby sulcatas because people were/are told they are a desert species and humidity will cause shell rot and respiratory infections. I'll bet you read this in books back in the days when we all read books. People trying to imitate what they think is happening in the wild has killed uncountable animals in captivity.

Our enclosures are NOT the wild, and the infinite number of variables at work in the wild are not understood, much less possible in captivity in a back yard or indoor tortoise table.

 

[Tom]

But almost everyone here say that we need to make sure that our tortoises have enclosures close to their natural habitat. I was in Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan (Russian tortoises are native to those areas) and there's almost nothing there but sand and rocks.... Plus hot and dry climate.

So should we introduce diseases, predators, periods of starvation, periods of drought and dehydration, etc...? These are all things from their natural habitats.

The goal is to emulate the beneficial things from their natural habitats, as best we can with whatever our level of understanding is at that time, and omit the things known to be dangerous or harmful, like sand and toxic plants that a torts might choose to eat for whatever reason. Part of the problem is our human ignorance about how they live in the wild and what really happens there. A good example is all the books from just a decade or two ago explaining that baby sulcatas need to be housed in dry desert conditions. "They come from an arid region..." Every sulcata book says this, and people all over the world took this to heart and tried their best to give their "arid region" tortoises the aridity that they thought they needed. This is EXACTLY what I did in 1991 and continued doing it right up until around 2008. I was wrong. The books were wrong. Our perception of how they lived in the wild was wrong. Yes it is an arid region for 8 or 9 months of every year over there, but none of those books mentioned the other 3-4 months of every year... You know... The MONSOON season with 100% humidity and torrential rains. Not coincidentally, this is the time of year when babies hatch in the wild!

People argued with me, just like they are in this thread, when I started saying babies need more hydration and humidity. They called me names, made fun of me, insulted me, threatened me... But I knew I was right and they were wrong. I knew it because I was living it.

People like Mark1 and SG2 argue that these tortoises live in areas with sand in the wild, so its fine to keep them with sand in captivity. This is no different than the people who argued that sulcatas come from dry areas, so we need to give them dry conditions in captivity. Turns out they were wrong. Their fantasies about how tortoises live in the wild are killing tortoises in captivity. What ended the sulcata argument was enough people seeing my results, imitating how I did it, and repeating those same positive results.

I back burnered all the info about sulcatas in the wild, and instead looked at what was happening right in front of our eyes in our captive enclosures. Our attempts to imitate what our perception was of how they live in the wild was literally killing them, disfiguring them, and causing terrible suffering for tortoises and tortoise keepers. When I ignored what was said about the wild and started doing what made more sense after nearly two decades of failure, I started seeing success. In those early days, I did not know about the monsoon season and babies hatching at the start of it. I could not explain to anyone why desert conditions did not work, and warm humid conditions along with hydration DID work. It was obvious what worked and what didn't, but people were very resistant to it, much like the people on this thread are resistant to the idea of telling people not to use sand. I was asked for scientific proof and citations from peer reviewed journals. There was nothing like that, and to this day I still don't think there is. The proof was the living animals right in front of our eyes.

Now, almost 2 decades after I started my blasphemous heresy against the establishment and what was perceived as "natural" tortoise care, it has become the standard all over the world. And it turns out that dry desiccating conditions, the "beef jerky" that SG2 is referring to, was all wrong, and fundamentally un-natural, while my method that produced optimal results, actually turned out to be the "natural" way.

In time, what I am saying about sand will turn out the same way and for the same reasons.

 

[Tom]

The real issue at hand is my significant other tracking you down for coaxing me into bringing a 7ft constrictor into the house 🤷‍♂️

That was a fine decision. Awesome species. Your significant other clearly does not yet understand the life enriching benefits of having awesome snakes around the house will bring. Some people can't be told and have to learn on their own the hard way. Eventually, he or she, will understand the awesomeness of the boa.

P.S. I just got two of them tonight, and might pick up a third albino one too...

 

[Tom]

Why would coir or bark have any less chance for build up?

I don't have the answer to your question, but in practice, we do not see coir or bark impactions with the same frequency as sand impactions, even though hardly anyone keeps them on sand anymore, while almost everyone keeps them on bark or mulch or coir.

Just as you can't prove the animals in question didn't die from sand impaction because of a disease, I can't prove they didn't. It very well may be that these impactions are happening because of disease processes, but if that is the case, these other substrate seem to pass more easily, while sand seems to want to collect and not pass as easily. That is what I have observed. Maybe its the weight of the material, the shape of the grains, or something to do with the concepts that @EppsDynasty has been explaining? I don't know the why, I just know the what.

 

[COmtnLady]

In 2019 I knew how to spell reptile, though sometimes transposed letters in tortoise. FORTUNATELY, I stumbled on TFO before I did much damage to one. I can understand some people coming here and not trusting TFO's knowledgeable experts they don't know yet, or their decades of expertise, maybe even thinking those of us who do trust them are "true believer" types who should be discounted wholesale. But I do trust TFO's wise elders; their info has guided me in my quest to help my Red Foot thrive despite being held captive in a completely wrong part of the world.

That said -
I keep seeing a fallacy in comparing "wild" to "captive".

"Wild" comments are based on limited cases. We have no way to study an "average" sample of wild tortoises. We can find a few and extrapolate probably/possibly how many exist and their demographics in a described area, but that doesn't necessarily reflect the actual population. In captivity we can know the exact ages (or at least figure out a good approximation) of most of the tortoises that we are comparing. We can know diets, temps, habitats, and so many other variables. In the wild we have no way to be sure of variables. For all we know a complete strata of age could be missing of the ones we could actually find in a particular area. There could be growth differentials due to environmental factors. Comparing captive and wild is a weak/faulty stance to begin with.

Its reasonably probable that a sampling of wild torts would have no seriously impacted tortoises because those ones crawled off into "safety" to hide-and-heal or die, with most evidence of such being eaten by predators or left buried in tunnelings, leaving no appreciable trace to study how many actually died of impaction in the wild. For every one that is found to necropsy, how many more are invisible? And what age are they? Was there a period when they would normally be growing but were stunted by unusual weather? What about disease or fungus removing or stunting some aspect? There are so many variables to factor in that its almost as bad as forcing a "one size fits all" treatment onto a a general group of different species.

Meanwhile, I am still going to trust the wisdom of TFO. These guys now their stuff. I'm already keeping a jungle tort in a place that has world class skiing... and a "hot" summer day is still to cold for the tort to be out in it for any length of time. I'm already putting this poor little tort's life at risk by making it dependent upon artificial humidity, heat, light and food sources. I'm going to do what the Pros at TFO say is optimal it.

No sand, no moss.


.

 

[Alex and the Redfoot]

These are really good points. At the same time statistics and sampling aren't better for captive tortoises. We don't know how many tortoises are kept on pure sand (also, calci-sand, Tortoise Life, wrong sand/substrate ratio) and how many are kept on proper substrate mixes. We don't know how many tortoises are kept on coir, bark, mulch or mixed substrates. In fact, no conclusions can be drawn from "I saw 10 sand impactions and someone told me about 1 mulch perforation" until we know more about captive tortoises population (I'm not discarding these reports, it's just maths nothing personal).

I've seen some papers on mortality causes of wild gopher tortoises - impaction wasn't mentioned there. COmtnLady made a good assumption why (however, researchers were able to identify infections as one of the leading causes so they didn't look only at worn and predated carapaces).

I'd like to make a little turn in this discussion:
* those who successfully keep their tortoises on sand mixes can you share what do you use and in what ratios (and for what species)?
* those who has a good contact with the vets, can you get some anamnesis details on sand impactions: species, substrate (pure/mixed sand and what kind), enclosure sizes, hydration routines, diet? I think, this information is gathered during the appointment before surgery is recommended.

 

[S2G]

Honestly after reading this entire discussion I'm even more convinced that sand is not the problem. I'll explain...

Post #222 had a bunch of interesting studies & what I've looked up reaffirms that. It basically boils down to this. They eat their natural substrate in the wild on purpose for a variety of reasons. Their natural substrate is sandy mineral type mix. They're totally at home in it there's no disputing that.

The problems comes into play in captivity WHEN they're kept in too small of an area with hardly any stimulation. Dehydration is said to play a part as well. They basically start eating all kinds of inanimate objects. They main culprit in these impactions is gravel/stone.

So what I conclude is that if you're NOT going to provide a spacious natural environment you need to take extreme caution in what you add to your enclosure, table, whatever. That includes any substrates they can eat in bulk including the ones with sand, be careful of plays, toys, wood etc. Essentially youre left with like orchid bark & large objects right.

However, if you give them space and a stimulating environment its really a non issue on top of what we already know which is hydration is super important.

If you want to cut corners you better take every precaution you can think of. Which is what most people are trying to do here. Cover people that refuse to do the right thing. Its not sand its improper care plain & simple. Im in the camp of if you cant provide the right care leave it at the store or donate it to someone who can

If Chris's instructions are followed like he mentions that setup is just fine. He gives the substrate mix & states he likes to add sand for x reason. He didnt say you had to. Look at the info & make you're own descision on how you want to go about things.

 

[Tom]

The problems comes into play in captivity WHEN they're kept in too small of an area with hardly any stimulation. Dehydration is said to play a part as well. They basically start eating all kinds of inanimate objects. They main culprit in these impactions is gravel/stone.

So what I conclude is that if you're NOT going to provide a spacious natural environment you need to take extreme caution in what you add to your enclosure, table, whatever. That includes any substrates they can eat in bulk including the ones with sand, be careful of plays, toys, wood etc. Essentially youre left with like orchid bark & large objects right.

However, if you give them space and a stimulating environment its really a non issue on top of what we already know which is hydration is super important.

None of the above is true. These are assumptions that you either made up, or you are repeating from someone else who made them up. I already told you that some of the cases I've seen happened in tortoises that had enormous outdoor enclosures and free access to all the water they could drink. Your conclusion is wrong.

Hydration and large enclosures are certainly important and beneficial, but neither of those things prevent sand impaction in at least some of the cases.

If you want to cut corners you better take every precaution you can think of. Which is what most people are trying to do here. Cover people that refuse to do the right thing. Its not sand its improper care plain & simple. Im in the camp of if you cant provide the right care leave it at the store or donate it to someone who can

You keep repeating the same wrong stuff based on the same incorrect assumptions and ignoring facts. Sand impactions happen even when people are doing what you call the "right" things. You think you've got it figured out, but you don't. You are ignoring reality, and substituting it with what your own misguided perception of reality is. We don't know why some get sand impacted and some don't, but its clearly not enclosures size and dehydration, at least in some cases. Perhaps that is the cause, or a contributing factor in some cases. There could be many factors in play that we do not know about or understand, but the problem we are discussing here cannot exist if there is no sand.

If Chris's instructions are followed like he mentions that setup is just fine.

This is incorrect. Because some tortoises don't get impacted some of the time, does not make it "just fine". You continue to ignore the fact that some tortoises get impacted and die when following that advice.