Hibernation monitoring

[skildpadde]

Hi. This is the beginning of my boys' second week of hibernation, so had them out to check them and weigh them. Temps in their fridge stayed between 4 and 6 C.
One gained 4g and the other 9g!
Now the 9g gainer had dug in deep in the mulch, so I think most of that 'weight gain' was mulch stuck to him.
The other however had stayed on the surface and was clean. I have read in other places that hibernating torts may absorb moisture from damp substrate and that can account for gains during hibernation, but it's kind of interesting to observe it happening for real.
I took them outside to weigh them, to keep temperature fluctuations minimal, but they both looked kind of annoyed at being disturbed...

Mette

[Kenneth]

Cool,

I've noticed the exact same with my two boettgeri's.
They have been hibernating in the fridge for 5 weeks since last wednesday.
Temps in the fridge fluctuate between 3,2 and 4,8 degrees.
Mostly around 3 - 3,5 degrees.. after weighing them (once a week) the temp is temporarily raised (by opening the door and having the hibernation box outside of the fridge during the check-up) to a maximum of 4,8.. then (when put back in) it cools down again to 3 - 3,5 degrees.

My animals weighed 191 and 108 grams at the time they started hibernating.
Ever since, they either lost 1 -2 grams... or gained the same amount of grams.
Weightloss (of both animals) is 1,4% at this time and seems to remain pretty stable.
I was aware of the fact that they could lose a short amount of bodyweight during hibernation.
Gaining weight was completely new to me... And it did pop up some questions...
"were the animals eating small amounts of the soil during hibernation ?".. not likely
"could the weightgain be explained by a rapid increase of internal parasites like worms?"
Again.. because of them having no parasites before hibernation (their manure had been checked by a vet just previous to the hibernation itself) it is most unlikely to assume this would be the cause of the animals gaining weight.

The theory of the animals absorbing moisture from the soil is in fact quite logical.
Some species of tortoise (like Centrochelys sulcata for instance) are known to be able to absorb water with their cloaca (as some species of aquatic turtles are able to substract oxygen from the water with their cloaca which enables them to stay under water for longer periods)..

Thanx for sharing this interesting observation!

[Ozric Jonathan]

Hi. I have also had a tortoise seem to make a slight weight gain whilst in hibernation. The first time this hapenned I assumed it was my mistake but since then it hapenned again despite me being very careful taking the weight and lightly brushing the tortoise to remove any bits of substrate sticking to the shell.

We had a long discussion once before about the ability (or not) of tortoises to take in water via the cloaca. I didn't see anything in that discussion that convinced me that they can definitely do this. Kirkie recently said that someone is researchng this and it would be useful to know.

[justmeandmytortoise]

Yes ... as Kirkie said there has been research carried out on this and there is a paper being written to be published soon. Will let you know more when I hear a publishing date

[skildpadde]

Originally Posted by justmeandmytortoise

Yes ... as Kirkie said there has been research carried out on this and there is a paper being written to be published soon. Will let you know more when I hear a publishing date

That sounds great. It is so rare to come across any actual research, as opposed to personal experience/opinion and anecdotal evidence.

Mette

[skildpadde]

Originally Posted by skildpadde

Hi. This is the beginning of my boys' second week of hibernation, so had them out to check them and weigh them. Temps in their fridge stayed between 4 and 6 C.
One gained 4g and the other 9g!
Now the 9g gainer had dug in deep in the mulch, so I think most of that 'weight gain' was mulch stuck to him.
The other however had stayed on the surface and was clean. I have read in other places that hibernating torts may absorb moisture from damp substrate and that can account for gains during hibernation, but it's kind of interesting to observe it happening for real.
I took them outside to weigh them, to keep temperature fluctuations minimal, but they both looked kind of annoyed at being disturbed...

Mette

This week one is 1g lighter than last week (that is still 3 g more then when hibernation started) the other is 5g heavier than last week, which ads up to a total gain of 14 g sice hibernation started.
Temps were 3C-7C

Mette

[Ozric Jonathan]

Mette that is fascinating. I think the hibernation is going well!

I'll be using a damp substrate but one disadvantage of this is that it might be too difficult to tell if the tortoise has emptied his baldder. What do you think?

[Kenneth]

Originally Posted by Ozric Jonathan

Mette that is fascinating. I think the hibernation is going well!

I'll be using a damp substrate but one disadvantage of this is that it might be too difficult to tell if the tortoise has emptied his baldder. What do you think?

I could tell mine urinated by the presence of the white salty secretion... they didn't lose much weight by urinating though..

[sky]

Hi Kenneth if your tort is in hibernation and it urinates this is dangerous your tort is dehydrating I would get up and over winter.

[skildpadde]

Originally Posted by Ozric Jonathan

Mette that is fascinating. I think the hibernation is going well!

I'll be using a damp substrate but one disadvantage of this is that it might be too difficult to tell if the tortoise has emptied his baldder. What do you think?

Mine are fairly large tortoises (1700g and 2100g approx each). So if they pass a significant amount of urine I expect to be able to see a noticeable and sudden weightloss, and probably notice the presence of some urates too on the substrate. It may be trickier with smaller torts.

Mette