Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Here are pics of our newest girl. We are hoping the baby in the previous post is a boy to eventually breed with her. Especially if his eyes develop color. Thanks.

Allegra

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What an absolutely beautiful tortoise face! Congratulations to the new addition to the family!

Gaby

She is doing well. She was a good eater when we got her. After her quarantine period and vet visit (de-worming etc.) she eats like a monster. I am very happy with her personality as well. She is very outgoing, but we are still trying to figure out a name for her.

Allegra

wow! What do the legs look like?

Here is a pic of her legs. She is quite beautiful!, I am hoping my little tort develops into a male. Our previous male seems to be either female or bobtailed male. Either way he can't breed. What sex do you think my little one is? It is the top pic, the bottom is the newest girl from the front. Thanks.

Allegra

Hi Allegra, like you I am very curious to sex my redfoots, but as I raised them from baby (they are around 3 years old now) this is a long-term project. I have taken plastron pictures very regularly and can track all the development and changes. Still,- as they are between 4" and 5" SCL, there is still much guessing there.
How big is the tortoise you are showing the plastron picture of? She / he seems to be in the 5" range, but that might be wrong. While you get an idea at that size, it seems that in many cases things only become obvious around the 1 kg mark.
At the moment your tortoise has a small tail and the tips of the anal scutes seem to go very close to the carapace (I am currently trying to get as many pictures as possible from a back-end view to determine, if the latter might be a criteria for sexing as well). So I would say female.
The anal notch angle is a bit over 90 degrees though, which would point at a male. So if the tortoise is still rather small, the tail might start growing and you might actually have a male.
I will post 2 pictures below to show you what I mean in terms of the distance of the anal scute tips from the carapace. Both animals are too young to be sexed accurately, but I have seen a number of males who had a wide distance and females that had a small distance.
Sorry that these are still just speculations!

Gaby

Thanks for the info, Gaby. Those pics are very informative but a bit racy! I'm sure they would be so embarassed that their mommy posted those pics, even if it to help. Haha! The baby is 5 5/8" and its tail is getting longer, and its shell rounder...so I guess I will have to be patient and see which way it develops.

Allegra