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Old 01-01-2014, 05:40 PM   #1
LonesomeGeorge
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Question I am doing it right?

I wanted to share with you how I look after my 2-3 year old Horsefield/Horsefields Tortoise Margo, to see if I am doing it right. I would really appreciate any replies.

She lives in a 1.5m Tortoise table with topsoil as substrate, heat lamp, UV/UVA strip, Spider Plant, soak/water dish, slate etc. The topsoil is sprayed with water occasionally to keep slightly damp, but not wet.

Her diet consists of Romaine Lettuce, dandelion leaves and no pellets. Obviously in the Summer her diet has a lot more variety. In the near future I will be growing my own weeds. As she is still a juvenile, she has a mix of NutroBal and CalciDust every day sprinkled on her food. She also has a cuttlebone/cuttlefish which she gnaws on. Margo has a bath every other day, where she soaks for 10mins in warm water.

It would be great for any advice, and replies.

Many thanks,

LonesomeGeorge
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Old 01-01-2014, 05:50 PM   #2
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Sounds good. Have you tried the Florrette Crispy Salad bag until you can get at your weeds? Bit more variety for Margo
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Old 01-01-2014, 06:27 PM   #3
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Be careful with Dandelions- they contain a medium amount of Oxylates, which if fed often build up, binging with calcium to form stones & dehydrate a tortoise. Try not to feed more than once a week, or twice if smaller amount. You can get a food called pre-alpin which is dried weeds, you add water to rehydrate. Its available on line & useful in winter.
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Old 01-01-2014, 07:04 PM   #4
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All sounds good. What are your temperatures?
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Old 01-01-2014, 08:14 PM   #5
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At this time of year when a good variety of weeds are hard to find, pellets like Nutrazu or Mazuri are good. I feed them once or twice a week.

Have a good look around for ribwort plantain and cats ear weeds as I find these are quite hardy and can be found through the winter. You can bulk these out with romaine and radicchio.
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Old 01-01-2014, 09:18 PM   #6
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Does your strip light emit UVB? as you didn't mention that it did.

I agree with adding a pelleted diet for at least the winter and about feeding Dandelion leaves to often.

Danny
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Old 01-01-2014, 09:46 PM   #7
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Florette crispy salad leaves can be added and rocket, occasional curly kale ( once a week ) butternut squash, there are some weeds about if you go hunting, I found some quite big thistles the other day.
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Old 04-01-2014, 04:18 AM   #8
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I give mine pellets a couple of times a week. They get floret crispy salad lambs lettuce some kale butter nut squash which they love occasionally watercress and whatever other tort friendly salad stuff I can find there is a good list on the tortoise table site. Also plantin can be found most of the year and the odd weed in sheltered areas if your lucky. Spider plants are a good one for them to nibble on winter pansies as long as they have been repotted with the soil washed off from garden centre and grown a bit. I also give grated carrot sometimes. X
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Old 04-01-2014, 04:21 AM   #9
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I give calci dust most days and nutria all about twice a week. It's not good to over do the nutribal as far as I know but sure someone will confirm x
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Last edited by cherylahutch; 04-01-2014 at 04:43 AM.
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Old 07-01-2014, 02:51 PM   #10
Horace2
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Quote:
Originally Posted by LonesomeGeorge View Post
I wanted to share with you how I look after my 2-3 year old Horsefield/Horsefields Tortoise Margo, to see if I am doing it right. I would really appreciate any replies.

She lives in a 1.5m Tortoise table with topsoil as substrate, heat lamp, UV/UVA strip, Spider Plant, soak/water dish, slate etc. The topsoil is sprayed with water occasionally to keep slightly damp, but not wet.

Her diet consists of Romaine Lettuce, dandelion leaves and no pellets. Obviously in the Summer her diet has a lot more variety. In the near future I will be growing my own weeds. As she is still a juvenile, she has a mix of NutroBal and CalciDust every day sprinkled on her food. She also has a cuttlebone/cuttlefish which she gnaws on. Margo has a bath every other day, where she soaks for 10mins in warm water.

It would be great for any advice, and replies.

Many thanks,

LonesomeGeorge
I would give pellets if I was you. I have had Horace 5 years this May. He will be 7 then. I give him pellets, 3 times a week. In between I give him Romaine lettuce plus weeds.
Horace is very well, his shell is great. When I first got him he was the size of a 50 pence coin now he is a very Big Boy!
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