Has anyone hibernated kinixys species?

[FLINTUS]

This is something I've heard of a few times now, that in the wild, certain ranges of kinixys hibernate naturally-serrateds included. I know of someone who has hibernated homeana with good success so I am wondering whether this is maybe something they need in captivity and perhaps why a lot have died off. Serrateds are definitely cold hardy, I know many who have them out at 10 regularly so just interested what people's opinions are of this.

[EJ]

The majority die due to high parasite load and disease in addition to failure to acclimate.

Originally Posted by FLINTUS

This is something I've heard of a few times now, that in the wild, certain ranges of kinixys hibernate naturally-serrateds included. I know of someone who has hibernated homeana with good success so I am wondering whether this is maybe something they need in captivity and perhaps why a lot have died off. Serrateds are definitely cold hardy, I know many who have them out at 10 regularly so just interested what people's opinions are of this.

[FLINTUS]

Originally Posted by EJ

The majority die due to high parasite load and disease in addition to failure to acclimate.

I know but there must be more to it than that, the % of WC ones coming in and dying off is way higher than most common tortoises being WC. Have you ever kept them Ed?

[EJ]

Honestly... all wild caughts pretty much die at the same rate.The key is to get them healthy enough to overcome acclimation.

I've dealt with wild caughts when I worked for an importer... very high mortality rate.

I had one erosa that I got as an adoption that was raised by a family 'that didn't have a clue'. It was a wild caught that they had for about 5 years. the kids got tired of it. It was one of the nicest looking K. erosa I've ever seen. I had it for a couple of years before I gave it to a breeder. I had no problems with it but the people 'without a clue'... did the hard job. It was fed mainly lettuce and tomatoes with supplements.

I'd like to get back into them one day.

Originally Posted by FLINTUS

I know but there must be more to it than that, the % of WC ones coming in and dying off is way higher than most common tortoises being WC. Have you ever kept them Ed?

[FLINTUS]

Originally Posted by stells

Most common tortoises acclimate easier than some of the more tropical species... and stress much less... if the tortoise is stressed the immune system is lower making diseases and parasitic loads harder to recover from.

Interesting. Why do you think this is? These guys have been kept for a while so hopefully have missed the drop off and die stage after a year or two.

[FLINTUS]

Originally Posted by stells

Why do I think what is?

The common tortoises acclimatising better when WC. Is it just down to us understanding hermanni, graecas etc. needs better than species from kinixys, indotestudo and so on or is there something deeper here? What I have noted about the Serrateds so far is they are very primitive compared to my reds, d'you think this might have something to do with it?

[egyptiandan64]

Nope

Common tortoises are only common because the acclimate well. If Kinixys acclimated well they would be common tortoises, so pretty much a catch 22 with that.

Most likely the reason why new tortoise owners do well with harder to acclimate species is the fact they have only 1 which cuts down a tonne on the stresses of acclimating.

Danny

[EJ]

Because you are rarely dealing with wild caught tortoises. In most cases you are dealing with many generation captive bred in the case of the European species.

Even the European species died off in mass numbers... as pointed out by some organizations.

What are Serrateds?

As technology and the sharing of information increases... so does the survival rate of all species.

Originally Posted by FLINTUS

The common tortoises acclimatising better when WC. Is it just down to us understanding hermanni, graecas etc. needs better than species from kinixys, indotestudo and so on or is there something deeper here? What I have noted about the Serrateds so far is they are very primitive compared to my reds, d'you think this might have something to do with it?