Yearling won’t eat anything but carrot and watermelon

[Lpalacios08]

I rescued two desert tortoises. Both didn’t lethargic and not super well. One died the same day I picked up from rescue group. The other gets daily soaks is in a tortoise table. Arcadia bulb and basking spot. Ceramic light at night. He ate a bit of grass and greens one day. Yesterday a small bit of parboiled carrots. I have tried everything hibiscus, all kinds of weeds and grass dandelions. No luck today I tried a litltle watermelon and he ate it all up and was exited to eat it. The rescue said he’s a yearling. I tried pellet food. Soaks twice a day for 15 minutes each. Should I just give the watermelon and carrots till health improves and keep trying the dandelion, hibiscus, greens and grass.

 

[wellington]

You need to keep trying the better stuff cuz watermelon and carrots is not an appropriate diet at all. Cut up some appropriate greens and soak some pellets and put some water melon juice on it. If he eats that, keep doing that, using less juice each time until he is eating what he should be.
Be sure the basking temps are correct, 95-100 or they can't digest their food properly and won't want to eat
Btw, an FYI, tortoises should not ever be kept in pairs. So if you plan on getting another, you have to house them separately

 

[Tom]

I rescued two desert tortoises. Both didn’t lethargic and not super well. One died the same day I picked up from rescue group. The other gets daily soaks is in a tortoise table. Arcadia bulb and basking spot. Ceramic light at night. He ate a bit of grass and greens one day. Yesterday a small bit of parboiled carrots. I have tried everything hibiscus, all kinds of weeds and grass dandelions. No luck today I tried a litltle watermelon and he ate it all up and was exited to eat it. The rescue said he’s a yearling. I tried pellet food. Soaks twice a day for 15 minutes each. Should I just give the watermelon and carrots till health improves and keep trying the dandelion, hibiscus, greens and grass.

Hello and welcome.

As Wellington explained, if you don't get the husbandry right, they arrest ever going to get right. Start here and look for the temperate species care sheet near the bottom:

Info For New People. Please Read This First.

Hello and welcome to tortoiseforum.org! We are all glad you are here! There is no other forum like this anywhere. We have tens of thousands of members from all over the world ranging from kids with their first tortoise to people who have been breeding and keeping high end tortoises since the...

tortoiseforum.org

I've rescued lots of young DTs and the info for how to do it and get them healthy is in the above linked threads.

 

[Michael Bird]

Tortoises can be very stubborn. You just have to be more stubborn.

My male Eastern Hermann's absolutely refused to eat dandelions and opuntia cactus (and a few other things) when I first got him. He was about 4 years old at that point and had been fed almost exclusively on grocery store lettuces by the previous owner.

It has taken some time and patience, but after mixing dandelion leaves in with other things that he likes, he readily eats the dandelions whenever I give them to him now.

He was more stubborn about the cactus. I've tried cutting it into very small pieces and mixing it with Mazuri or with ZooMed Grassland Tortoise pellets (both soaked in lots of water) but he actually picked the cactus pieces out and only ate the pellet food for a long time. However, we finally had a victory today after almost six months of trying! I gave him a bunch of Mazuri LS pellets thoroughly soaked with water, and mixed in a portion of an (approximately) 3"x5" cactus pad chopped up in small chunks, and he not only ate everything in the food bowl except for a couple of small cactus pieces that he couldn't manage to grab, but he then also walked over to his slate feeding stone where I put the rest of the cactus pad and tore into the raw pad and ate all of it except for a piece about the size of a U.S. Quarter!

I'll have to wait and see if he continues to eat the good stuff when I give it to him again, but I'm glad that he's finally eating some more things that are really good for him. (And the fact that I have a bunch of cold hardy cactus plants growing in the yard is an added incentive to get him to want to eat them as they can be a readily available source of food even through the winter.)

A few things that he never hesitated at all to eat, and still readily eats them whenever I provide them, are:
* Young grape leaves (he doesn't seem to like the large/older leaves as much)
* Mulberry leaves
* Hardy Hibiscus and Rose of Sharon leaves and flowers (he actually RUNS for the flowers)
* Coleus leaves
* Echeverria hens and chicks petals
* Autumn Glory stonecrop/sedum leaves (strangely, he doesn't really go for other types of sedum, although he will eat a bit now and then)
* Coneflower/Echinacea leaves (he ate a few flower petals but I don't think he liked the spiky center cones since he completely ignores them now)
* Rocket lettuce (arugula)
* Mallow leaves and flowers (we have Marsh Mallow and Dwarf Mallow that grow wild here)
* Crimson clover leaves (he doesn't like the flowers)
* Giant Hollyhock flowers and leaves from the flower stalks (he doesn't like the leaves from the base "shrub", though)
* Spring Mix (the grocery store lettuces he was raised on, but every store here only sells it with about half spinach so I don't give it to him very often as I have to pick out the spinach and throw it away because I don't like spinach and he can't have it)

So just keep trying different healthy foods to find things that your tortoise will eat (not watermelon except as an extremely rare treat, and only small amounts of carrots once in a while), and once you find things that they really like, start mixing in other healthy foods and hope that they will start accepting a good healthy variety. The link that Tom provided is an excellent place to start for more info.

 

[TammyJ]

Tortoises can be very stubborn. You just have to be more stubborn.

My male Eastern Hermann's absolutely refused to eat dandelions and opuntia cactus (and a few other things) when I first got him. He was about 4 years old at that point and had been fed almost exclusively on grocery store lettuces by the previous owner.

It has taken some time and patience, but after mixing dandelion leaves in with other things that he likes, he readily eats the dandelions whenever I give them to him now.

He was more stubborn about the cactus. I've tried cutting it into very small pieces and mixing it with Mazuri or with ZooMed Grassland Tortoise pellets (both soaked in lots of water) but he actually picked the cactus pieces out and only ate the pellet food for a long time. However, we finally had a victory today after almost six months of trying! I gave him a bunch of Mazuri LS pellets thoroughly soaked with water, and mixed in a portion of an (approximately) 3"x5" cactus pad chopped up in small chunks, and he not only ate everything in the food bowl except for a couple of small cactus pieces that he couldn't manage to grab, but he then also walked over to his slate feeding stone where I put the rest of the cactus pad and tore into the raw pad and ate all of it except for a piece about the size of a U.S. Quarter!

I'll have to wait and see if he continues to eat the good stuff when I give it to him again, but I'm glad that he's finally eating some more things that are really good for him. (And the fact that I have a bunch of cold hardy cactus plants growing in the yard is an added incentive to get him to want to eat them as they can be a readily available source of food even through the winter.)

A few things that he never hesitated at all to eat, and still readily eats them whenever I provide them, are:
* Young grape leaves (he doesn't seem to like the large/older leaves as much)
* Mulberry leaves
* Hardy Hibiscus and Rose of Sharon leaves and flowers (he actually RUNS for the flowers)
* Coleus leaves
* Echeverria hens and chicks petals
* Autumn Glory stonecrop/sedum leaves (strangely, he doesn't really go for other types of sedum, although he will eat a bit now and then)
* Coneflower/Echinacea leaves (he ate a few flower petals but I don't think he liked the spiky center cones since he completely ignores them now)
* Rocket lettuce (arugula)
* Mallow leaves and flowers (we have Marsh Mallow and Dwarf Mallow that grow wild here)
* Crimson clover leaves (he doesn't like the flowers)
* Giant Hollyhock flowers and leaves from the flower stalks (he doesn't like the leaves from the base "shrub", though)
* Spring Mix (the grocery store lettuces he was raised on, but every store here only sells it with about half spinach so I don't give it to him very often as I have to pick out the spinach and throw it away because I don't like spinach and he can't have it)

So just keep trying different healthy foods to find things that your tortoise will eat (not watermelon except as an extremely rare treat, and only small amounts of carrots once in a while), and once you find things that they really like, start mixing in other healthy foods and hope that they will start accepting a good healthy variety. The link that Tom provided is an excellent place to start for more info.

This is a great post! Very helpful and detailed. Only one thing I disagree with: tortoises are NOT stubborn. To call them "stubborn" is anthropomorphic. If you have a tortoise that won't eat what you are giving him, it's either because he is sick, insecure, or is not accustomed to that as "food". He is eating what he has been eating all along, so he rejects some new stuff. As you said, time, innovation and patience will pay off!

 

[Tom]

Tortoises can be very stubborn. You just have to be more stubborn.

My male Eastern Hermann's absolutely refused to eat dandelions and opuntia cactus (and a few other things) when I first got him. He was about 4 years old at that point and had been fed almost exclusively on grocery store lettuces by the previous owner.

It has taken some time and patience, but after mixing dandelion leaves in with other things that he likes, he readily eats the dandelions whenever I give them to him now.

He was more stubborn about the cactus. I've tried cutting it into very small pieces and mixing it with Mazuri or with ZooMed Grassland Tortoise pellets (both soaked in lots of water) but he actually picked the cactus pieces out and only ate the pellet food for a long time. However, we finally had a victory today after almost six months of trying! I gave him a bunch of Mazuri LS pellets thoroughly soaked with water, and mixed in a portion of an (approximately) 3"x5" cactus pad chopped up in small chunks, and he not only ate everything in the food bowl except for a couple of small cactus pieces that he couldn't manage to grab, but he then also walked over to his slate feeding stone where I put the rest of the cactus pad and tore into the raw pad and ate all of it except for a piece about the size of a U.S. Quarter!

I'll have to wait and see if he continues to eat the good stuff when I give it to him again, but I'm glad that he's finally eating some more things that are really good for him. (And the fact that I have a bunch of cold hardy cactus plants growing in the yard is an added incentive to get him to want to eat them as they can be a readily available source of food even through the winter.)

A few things that he never hesitated at all to eat, and still readily eats them whenever I provide them, are:
* Young grape leaves (he doesn't seem to like the large/older leaves as much)
* Mulberry leaves
* Hardy Hibiscus and Rose of Sharon leaves and flowers (he actually RUNS for the flowers)
* Coleus leaves
* Echeverria hens and chicks petals
* Autumn Glory stonecrop/sedum leaves (strangely, he doesn't really go for other types of sedum, although he will eat a bit now and then)
* Coneflower/Echinacea leaves (he ate a few flower petals but I don't think he liked the spiky center cones since he completely ignores them now)
* Rocket lettuce (arugula)
* Mallow leaves and flowers (we have Marsh Mallow and Dwarf Mallow that grow wild here)
* Crimson clover leaves (he doesn't like the flowers)
* Giant Hollyhock flowers and leaves from the flower stalks (he doesn't like the leaves from the base "shrub", though)
* Spring Mix (the grocery store lettuces he was raised on, but every store here only sells it with about half spinach so I don't give it to him very often as I have to pick out the spinach and throw it away because I don't like spinach and he can't have it)

So just keep trying different healthy foods to find things that your tortoise will eat (not watermelon except as an extremely rare treat, and only small amounts of carrots once in a while), and once you find things that they really like, start mixing in other healthy foods and hope that they will start accepting a good healthy variety. The link that Tom provided is an excellent place to start for more info.

I just wanted to point out two things in an otherwise great post:
1. Spinach is a good tortoise food when used once in a while. Whole meals every day for weeks on end would not be good, but a little bit mixed in with the spring mix once or twice a week is totally fine and actually good for them. High in iron and calcium, and those oxalates are not the boogeyman we once thought they were.
2. Chunks of cactus are very dangerous. Whole pads work best, or large long stips, but never chunks. More on that here:

Public Service Announcement - Tortoise Food Chunks

I was reminded today that not everyone knows that "hard" foods like opuntia, cucumber, carrots, or this time of year, pumpkin should not be cut up and fed in chunks. Chunks of these types of food will be swallowed whole by tortoises and can cause them to choke to death. It doesn't happen every...

tortoiseforum.org

I know you are not a noob that doesn't know what they are doing, but we just had an experienced member lose a tortoise this way less than a year ago, and I was surprised that he didn't know this. Because of that, I take the opportunity to point it out to everyone instead of assuming that all of our experienced long-term members know everything.

 

[Michael Bird]

I just wanted to point out two things in an otherwise great post:
1. Spinach is a good tortoise food when used once in a while. Whole meals every day for weeks on end would not be good, but a little bit mixed in with the spring mix once or twice a week is totally fine and actually good for them. High in iron and calcium, and those oxalates are not the boogeyman we once thought they were.
2. Chunks of cactus are very dangerous. Whole pads work best, or large long stips, but never chunks. More on that here:

Public Service Announcement - Tortoise Food Chunks

I was reminded today that not everyone knows that "hard" foods like opuntia, cucumber, carrots, or this time of year, pumpkin should not be cut up and fed in chunks. Chunks of these types of food will be swallowed whole by tortoises and can cause them to choke to death. It doesn't happen every...

tortoiseforum.org

I know you are not a noob that doesn't know what they are doing, but we just had an experienced member lose a tortoise this way less than a year ago, and I was surprised that he didn't know this. Because of that, I take the opportunity to point it out to everyone instead of assuming that all of our experienced long-term members know everything.

I know that spinach is OK in moderate amounts, but the stores here only sell the Spring Mix salad with about 50% spinach, and that's just way too much.

I guess I should clarify that "chunks" of cactus in my case were very small pieces, cut to about 1mm cubed or smaller, just to try to get him to eat them along with the Mazuri and ZooMed stuff.

Thank you for the clarification, though, since it is good to be sure.

 

[Tom]

I know that spinach is OK in moderate amounts, but the stores here only sell the Spring Mix salad with about 50% spinach, and that's just way too much.

I guess I should clarify that "chunks" of cactus in my case were very small pieces, cut to about 1mm cubed or smaller, just to try to get him to eat them along with the Mazuri and ZooMed stuff.

Thank you for the clarification, though, since it is good to be sure.

My hope is to never see another tortoise choke to death. I'm glad when people already know this!

Our spring mix is spinach heavy most of the time too. Since I rarely use it anyway, I don't mind the spinach.