Weird Brumation Diversity Among My Russian Creep

[jsheffield]

I almost posted this in the other brumation thread, then decided not to mess that one up....

My five Russians live inside except for daytrips outside during the warm months. The first Russian that came to live with me had never brumated, so I set up his enclosure to support that lifestyle; then did the same with the big enclosure I set up for the four females. The weird thing is that although living under very similar conditions, the tortoises in my Russian creep live through the NH winter very differently.

Their inside enclosures are pretty big and most of the space in the enclosures is kept at 65F or higher, with some basking/warming space going up to around 100F during the daytime. I live in New Hampshire, so I heat the enclosures to hold the baseline heat and then have a large basking and UVB area at one end of each enclosure.

The male has gotten up every single day of the years he's lived with me, trundles over to warm up and soak up some UVB, eats some greens, goes back to bask for an hour or so, then trundles back to his cave.

Two of the females follow the same routine that the male does, except (of course) in their enclosure.

One of the other females disappeared for a few days or a week at a time periodically throughout this winter. She'd show up looking dusty and a bit out of it, and I'd scoop her up for a warm soak and then let her go back to doing her thing.

The final female dropped out of sight for most of the winter, with only brief periods of activity. I got nervous about her after a few weeks and climbed into the enclosure to find her (thinking I might be finding a tort-corpse), feeling through the substrate with my fingers for her shell. I found a spot in the back of the females' enclosure that was cooler than the rest, due to ground contact and a gap between the heaters I was using. My laser thermometer clocked it at 47F. When I touched her shell back in this corner, it was cold enough that I was scared, but when I pulled her out she moved her legs a bit. I put her in a shallow tub of 75F water (worried about shocking her with 85F, which is what I normally aim for) until she seemed to wake up a bit, then I warmed the bath and kept her soaking for an hour before returning her to the enclosure for some CHE and UVB and greens with the other ladies.

My questions are:

• why do different torts under the same conditions act/brumate differently?
• should I eliminate the cold spot? (or increase its size and the temp difference to enhance the opportunity for brumation)
• should I leave them alone or continue to soak them when I see them emerge (or get too scared and dig them out)?

In the last week of March, they all emerged, like a switch got flicked, and so I soaked all of them and they've all been out now for almost two weeks... I wondered if the light coming through the windows in my office was different enough to bring about some change, or if the floor of the office warmed just enough to bring about some change.

Jamie

 

[Tom]

My questions are:

• why do different torts under the same conditions act/brumate differently?
• should I eliminate the cold spot? (or increase its size and the temp difference to enhance the opportunity for brumation)
• should I leave them alone or continue to soak them when I see them emerge (or get too scared and dig them out)?

-There are many variables that determine why some do and some don't. Genetics, environment parameters, age, history of the individual (WC or CB, brumated before, or not...),etc... I don't have a definitive answer for this question, but I've seen similar results when torts are given a choice. My way of looking at it is this: Mother nature doesn't give them a choice, so neither do I. Too many times in captive situations, out tortoises will choose poorly due to instincts that have evolved to save them over millions of years in our artificial and foreign environments. I've seen many that are determined to "go to sleep" even in indoor tropical summer conditions, and others that don't want to brumate even with night temps in the 30s.
-If you don't want them to brumate, then yes, I would eliminate the cold spot. After much experimentation over many years, and also conferring with other Russian keepers, 39F seems to be the ideal temp for Russians to brumate. Mine would be terribly restless at 47, and I'd worry about them over the course of a brumation season at that temp.
-At your stated temperatures, and because you are not trying to brumate them, I would soak them and keep them up. A good warm soak and some "sun" will often snap them out of a winter funk.

Light duration, intensity, day length, and temperature all play a part in flipping that switch in my experience. Even when kept in a basement with no windows with lights on timers, they somehow just know.

We have had the brumation argument many times here on TFO. Over many years with many people contributing their personal experiences, it is clear that they do not have to be brumated if people don't want to do it. They will survive for many years and even breed without brumating. I've done it both ways with many species many times. I think most people that have done it both ways feel it is beneficial to brumate a tortoise that would brumate in the wild, and this is my opinion on the matter. I think there are immeasurable behavioral and endocrinological benefits to the practice.

 

[jsheffield]

-There are many variables that determine why some do and some don't. Genetics, environment parameters, age, history of the individual (WC or CB, brumated before, or not...),etc... I don't have a definitive answer for this question, but I've seen similar results when torts are given a choice. My way of looking at it is this: Mother nature doesn't give them a choice, so neither do I. Too many times in captive situations, out tortoises will choose poorly due to instincts that have evolved to save them over millions of years in our artificial and foreign environments. I've seen many that are determined to "go to sleep" even in indoor tropical summer conditions, and others that don't want to brumate even with night temps in the 30s.
-If you don't want them to brumate, then yes, I would eliminate the cold spot. After much experimentation over many years, and also conferring with other Russian keepers, 39F seems to be the ideal temp for Russians to brumate. Mine would be terribly restless at 47, and I'd worry about them over the course of a brumation season at that temp.
-At your stated temperatures, and because you are not trying to brumate them, I would soak them and keep them up. A good warm soak and some "sun" will often snap them out of a winter funk.

Light duration, intensity, day length, and temperature all play a part in flipping that switch in my experience. Even when kept in a basement with no windows with lights on timers, they somehow just know.

We have had the brumation argument many times here on TFO. Over many years with many people contributing their personal experiences, it is clear that they do not have to be brumated if people don't want to do it. They will survive for many years and even breed without brumating. I've done it both ways with many species many times. I think most people that have done it both ways feel it is beneficial to brumate a tortoise that would brumate in the wild, and this is my opinion on the matter. I think there are immeasurable behavioral and endocrinological benefits to the practice.

Tom,

Thanks, as always, for your thoughtful and detailed response.

I'm redoing a couple of my enclosures once the weather is full warm, so I'll do the Russians as well, and decide whether or not to brumate them.

Jamie