You’ve got to have owned one of these bits of Jurasic history to know the annual dread of opening the hibernation box. Will it/won’t it have made it through another winter?
So far this year, so good. She also had a good afternoon with sun on her bum.
This one has been around for about 60+ years, which is a good innings for an Ibaran Spur Thighed. (No, they don’t all live for huindreds of years.)
The next worry is waiting for the first dump.
Funny old world.
(Also got the bar end weights to fit with the hand guards. The shop said it could not be done. To**ers.)
Importing tortoises from their native habitat is illegal and carries a heavy penalty. (Sometimes there is good law made.)
Not only that but the Gallapagos ones are very difficult to get in your hand bag or up your jumper without looking a bit odd. Its the 50 kilos bit that gives the game away.
Like the past posts have said, English bred ones are available. Just go rootling around on line.
Remember, this is not a short term commitment. I’ve been looking after mine for about 55 years, give or take. And, yup, they do take looking after. The good news is that, unlike spaniels, very little grooming, cheap to feed, and you don’t have to take them to the woods/park for exercise or walk them round the block before bedtime.
I love tortoises, not had one since my last one died a few years back, bless him.
I know what you mean about the dreaded hibernation, used to feel really apprehensive when it came to wake up time ever since I found a shell full of mush once :crying: RIP Stanley.
Male tortoises have one of the strongest sex drive urges of all animals. (Some East African ones bit their way out of a chain link fence enclosure one night because a female a hundred yards away was on heat.)
Put more simply, a randy male tortoise will bonk anything that fits.
