I was just wondering how severe this bite was. In my breeding group I notice quite a bit of biting (the male biting the females). The females are tough though and there has not yet been any bloodshed. Males bite females for breeding purposes. What is the size difference between your torts? In my group the male is the smallest at about 5", with the females being about 7" and 9".

Personally, I almost always see a better feeding response when the tortoises are not kept in groups. I attribute that to the fact that whenever they are together the male is busy trying to mate the females and this causes some stress on the females, so neither sex tends to eat as much, except for after the females lay their eggs (then all hell breaks loose). That's why I'm raising the russian that I hatched last year all by herself. With not other torts to bug her, she eats a ton (I literally feed her a dinner plate of food every morning, and it's gone by nightfall), and she grows at a high rate (at a year old she is nearing 5".

I think that overall the torts would do better by themselves, but I wouldn't be able to breed them that way. With the torts together they breed every day and lay eggs every couple months (summer and winter, all year round). I doubt that would happen if I kept them separately most of the time. Now I've just got to get better at finding the eggs quicker (lost over a dozen this year because I didn't know they had laid...I do have four in the incubator though).

[ Hide Replies ]

• Russian feeding response question... - Nicodemus, Thu Jan 17 09:47:49 2008
• RE: Russian feeding response question... - bradtort, Thu Jan 17 11:10:59 2008
• RE: Russian feeding response question... - Nicodemus, Thu Jan 17 12:15:39 2008
• Severity of bite?... - -ryan-, Wed Jan 23 14:34:05 2008
• RE: Severity of bite?... - Nicodemus, Sun Feb 10 08:18:38 2008