Pics and details on Pellet fed tort/Cameo

[pagan queen]

There is some interest in how my tort, Cameo is getting on. I have had her from a hatchling, 3 months old. She is fed on mainly pellets through the winter and all weeds during the summer. She is kept in a viv all winter and during cold days in summer and during the night. I don't hibernate her. She doesn't have UV lighting, I prefer to supplement and feed pellets.
Some people believe that pellet fed torts and if they are grown too fast causes pyramided shells.

Cameo is 3 years 4 months and measures 17cm/5 and a half inches and weighs 952g. I don't bathe her daily, only weekly but she has a large bowl of water in her viv where she often sits for long periods. The viv temps are 33c at the warm end and 24c at the cool end. I have a stat with night vision thing (can't remember the correct term) that keeps the temps at 15 through the night. I don't spray the soil every day, maybe once a week, the humidity usually stays around 50% with the water bowl.
Anything you wish to ask, please feel free.

Here is the lady herself.

[Merlin M]

She is beautiful and has a wonderful shell!

[becciwales]

Aww, she's beautiful x

[Gordon]

Very nice i also use vivs i even have my breeding group of golden greeks in a very large one and they do just fine i think they proved that this year with the amount of babies they produced

[Suze65]

Sorry but I can't help noticing that she does have some pyramiding and she is quite a size for a 3 year old. If we are going to discuss the pros and cons of a diet consisting mainly of pellet food, and you mentioned not watering the substrate more than once a week, then I feel I have to point this out.
Having said that , yes she is lovely , but not growing with a smooth shell.

I am only saying this as part of a friendly debate, please don't be cross with me

[Pussygalore]

I'm so glad someone else said something as I daren't but if you look at the pictures taken at the begin of the year and they are in the other thread
then you can see the difference, sadly the weight isn't mentioned in that photo. However she's still a lovely tort and it goes to show that viv's can be used with success, there are very few that are grown without any pyramidding or fast growth and haven't been wild caught its very hard to achieve and this tort is much better than most.
http://www.shelledwarriors.co.uk/for...ad.php?t=67260 Hopefully this link works

[becciwales]

In fairness, (and i know i am new to this tort keeping malarkey) I'm yet to see a perfectly smooth few year old tort. Please if i am wrong, show me the pics and I will apologise to whoever necessary. I mean captive bred and raised.

[Pussygalore]

This was my young sully who was just over two in this picture, I kept her pretty much the same as I did my Ibera, with a daily bath, a small amount of Mazuri and Pre Alpine daily along with weeds/plants again daily, she was in a 6x4 table with two combined lamps and extra lighting for any dark areas. Bolder also had the run of a 8x6 greenhouse (floor) planted and soiled and an outside grassed enclosure weather permitting, her table temps were pretty much the same as the Ibera, basking areas of 32-34 and the rest 20c the only difference was that she also had night temps of 20c rather than a drop. I know its not the traditional way of sully care and that she was probably to heavy being around 1600 gr but I was quite pleased with her appearance and had never had any experience with sully's so played it by what she seemed to be happy with.

[Pussygalore]

I might be wrong but I think there's someone called Hermione or similar who has pretty perfect torts and there are a few on RFUK who don't come here who also can produce and grow without any problems. It does seem to be the keepers that have been keeping for many years though, I mustn't forget Chris/ Naturlis or Ej/Ed amoung those.

[Suze65]

Well I have, they belong to my sister in law, they are smooth as a babies bum, and mine of the same age are not far off that. It is hard to grow torts in captivity with a smooth shell, but it is possible.

All I can say is the way we do it, we keep them in tables, bath hatchlings daily,
When they get to a year old , bath less, maybe 3 times a week and so on. We keep substrate moist ( never let it dry out completely ) , and keep water available. We never feed with pellets,only weeds, flowers and salad leaves.
We do hibernate our torts, but not hatchlings. And they live out side all summer.

That's just our way of doing things and it seems to be working. Some do grow slightly faster than others , but none are growing very fast. You may ask what is very fast, I don't know, but ours are all growing at a slow to moderate spread.

I'm not saying which is the right or wrong way, but we seem to be achieving fairly good results.