Reptile & Amphibian Forums

During a recent conversation with a guy who breeds Testudo Kleinmanni, I was told that the Egyptian Minature tortoise can be accurately sexed (by tail size/shape) as early as hatchling stage!
I have never heard this before, or read anything like it in any literature I have found, and am wondering if that is because,
A.) It isn't true?
or,
B.) So few people have bred Kleinmanni in any great numbers long enough for It to be a commonly accepted fact?
The breeder in question has been succesfully breeding Egyptians for 9 years now, and has captive bred examples from hatchlings to nine years of age, so would know for sure if his 'predictions' are correct? (I'm guessing that at 9yrs the gender would be defined?)
I really would like to know if anyone with any experience with breeding Kleinmanni's could offer an opinion here, as I find this to be very interesting.
Cheers,
Johnny

I have a colony of seven Egyptians and I am inclined to accept option A in your post. The tail is a good identifier a little later in life but I just cannot accept accurately sexing the hatchlings at such an early age. This sexing problem transcends many species of tortoise. They all look the same at those early ages, male or female.

>The tail is a good identifier a little later in life but I just >cannot accept accurately sexing the hatchlings at such an early >age.

Thanks for the response!
If you've bred and raised any to maturity can you say at what age would you say the gender of a Kleinmanni is accurately definable?
Also, what temperature do you incubate at?
Once again, many thanks for your feedback!
Johnny

I've hatched out a few hundred Leopard tortoises and only about 60 kleinmanni. I couldn't venture a guess on the kleinmanni but on the leopards I can give you a good guess as to the sexes. The point is that it could be just a feeling based on a subconscious recognition of some very subtle differences or just wishful thinking. If the breeder is guaranteing the sexes he is definately wrong. If he is offering his best educated guess as to the sexes that is as good as you are going to get.
Ed

In my experience, about the only species I feel comfortable sexing at a very early age is Geochelone elegans (sexual differentiation pages on 19 species including yearling star tortoises are available via the World Chelonian Trust link below under "Newest Web sections: 03-04-2003 Sexual Determination Pages" )

Some Pyxis (P. a. brygooi in my experience) may be sexable at an early age as well but it's still too early to be sure.

Anyone else have experiences sexing young specimens of other genuses/species? Kinixys maybe?

Chris

World Chelonian Trust

Hey, Chris,

I've been working with Pancakes for about 9 years now and have found that they are a species which can 'generally' be sexed at around a year of age. I've heard some people claim they can determine this even sooner! At a year, I can pretty much say what sex it is and so far I've been correct. I'm not dealing with a ton of babies, but enough to feel pretty sure about what I'm seeing.

Matt

MattJ, would you mind sexing this one for me?

Thanks!

DanP

Dan... I would say it's neither! Your Pancake was likely born with a RARE genetic anomoly in which no sex has been genetically determined. So, you should send it to me and I'll make observations over the next few years to verify that my theory is correct. Sound like a plan to you? I'll be looking for an Airborne box early next week.

Thanks,

Matt
p.s. - NICE pic!

By Jove you are right! The sex of this tortoise is not genetically determined. Of course sex in most tortoises and turtles is never genetically determined since sex determination is temperature dependent.

But with a daytime high temp of 89F it might be female, but with an incubation time of 198 days, I might think it could be male?

I'll check back with you in a year.

Thanks Ed,
I knew from this site and various other online forums that you had lots of experience with Kleinmanni and was hoping you would speak up

>I've hatched out a few hundred Leopard tortoises and only about 60 kleinmanni.

Wow!, 60 is very impressive, how long has it taken to produce that number, and from how many adults?
Also, what temp do you incubate at?
I'm guessing that out of 60 offspring you must have kept some and maintained them to maturity?, what sort of male/female ratio have you produced?
Thanks,
Johnny

These guys have been a great joy and absolute heart breakers to me.
I've got about 7 that I've raised to adult. One of those, a female, have been producing eggs but none fertile yet. I do have one male that has produced fertile eggs with a WC female though.
I've always incubated the eggs at a temperature of 29 to 31 C based on the idea that in other testudo the crossover temperature for male to female in TSD is, I think, 30 C. My incubator I allow to vary based on this idea. On the animals that I've kept track of and that I have there are about 15. of the 15, 5 are females. The last group of 12 that I hatched out, 3 were females. So it's been running 1/3 to 1/4 females.
Now when these were being imported in large #s early on there were a great number of confescations based on that they were under 4 inches and that is because mostly males were being imported. I've spoke to a few people that have seen these in the markets of Cairo and they too tell me that mostly males are collected. So, it is not a stretch to think that a large portion of the population are males.
Ed