Jacqui's Captive Bred Tortoises

The tortoise is a living fossil having survived since the dawn of the age of reptiles, approximately 200 million years ago.

Collection for exportation and habitat destruction have dramatically reduced populations in their native countries around the Mediterranean such as France, Spain, Italy, the former Yugoslavia, Turkey, Greece and northern Africa.  In Britain, with wet summers and cold damp winters, they are outside their distribution range, but if basic guidelines are followed, a captive tortoise can have as long and happy a life as possible, often exceeding 90 years!

Annex A species according to registration with DEFRA are:

  In 1984 it was agreed with the EEC Council to treat three species of Mediterranean tortoise (the Spur-thighed, Herman's and Marginated Tortoise from Greece) according to Annex A, of the Convention for International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES).  The Egyptian Tortoise (Testudo kleinmanni) was added to Annex A in 1994. 

This meant that these four species were protected and commercial trade strictly prohibited.  For the sale or exchange of these protected tortoises by private individuals a license (Article 10) is required, obtainable from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) at Bristol. This license applies to the selling of eggs as well, but not to the giving away of either tortoises or eggs.  

It is an offence, carrying a custodial sentence to sell Annex A tortoises without an appropriate license, anyone trying to do so, should be reported to DEFRA and the local police, who have a wild animal

The Article 10 certificate (yellow certificate) allows for one transfer of the tortoise to a new owner. After the tortoise reaches 100mm plastron length, it must be micro chipped and a new article 10 certificate applied for stating the parents license numbers, if the tortoise is to be used commercially or its off spring sold.

Tortoise husbandry.

Rearing a baby tortoise does require a degree of commitment to its welfare and will need some time and care and a little initial expense to create the right conditions. Once the set up is completed and the level of care and hygiene good, then the “ongoing” costs will be minimal.

In order to understand how to simulate the wild in captivity, we need to understand the wild!

Herman’s tortoises have evolved to thrive in hot, dry places where Vegetation is often sparse particularly in summer. Typically they live on South- facing hillsides, sleeping at night under rocks and low growing vegetation or bushes.

In the morning they emerge to bask in the sun and stay there until they are warm enough to become active. At this point they wander off in search of food, taking nibbles off plants as they go.

The process of warming and cooling the body using sunlight or other external heat source is called THERMOREGULATION . By late morning the sun is high in the sky, so the tortoises return to their scrapes/beds to pass the hot part of the day in aestivation/siesta mode. (This is the opposite of hibernation and means sleeping through the heat, not the cold)

They can often be seen emerging again in the late afternoon for an evening feed, and so on throughout the spring and early summer months, which are their ideal times for feeding. In the mid summer, the temperatures are VERY hot and food is scarce so often tortoises will dig themselves into their hides for a longer period of aestivation until the temperatures cool a little and the plants are re energized.

As the summer fades and autumn descends, the tortoises are biologically programmed to take their cues from the weather, daylight length and temperature. They subsequently begin a  process of winding down for winter. This is manifested in them eating less and less, and moving about less until they stop all together. However, they do remain awake with a little activity, until all of their eaten food is digested and passed through their guts. Once they have emptied themselves completely and conserved enough water to see them through hibernation, they head for their scrape/hide place and dig themselves right in, often so deep there is no way to tell they are there. They would then rest there from November or December (depending on the temperatures) until the warmer weather is felt in mid march time.

The first warm days of spring brings the tortoises up again, emerging from the ground to bask and take their first feed of the year. At this stage they also urinate passing out the toxins that have built up in their bodies over the winter and are then re energized to mate.

After mating, the females dig their nests and lay their eggs usually in May and June. Once they have laid the eggs, they have no more to do with them, or the emerging babies. The summer sun incubates the eggs and the babies emerge from the ground around September. In the wild many eggs and hatchlings are predated by foxes, hedgehogs and birds, but those which do survive live an identical lifestyle to the adults, totally independent from day one, though often  quite secretively. 

At around 7 to 10 years old tortoises become sexually active, mating and producing fertile eggs for the next generation.

Tortoises can live for up to a 100 years, so they are not a responsibility to be taken lightly and may require provisions in the owners will!

In captivity, our typically English gardens are not an ideal replication of the wild and often represent a real lush and plentiful supply of food, which can inhibit the foraging behaviour found in the wild. Therefore feeding activity can last throughout the day as the heat in the UK is rarely hot enough to warrant an aestivation period. So the tortoise can have more food, less exercise and longer feeding periods which can lead to excessive/uneven/unhealthy growth. It also occurs that due to the short seasons and dull days in the UK the owner can attempt to compensate for this, with over feeding. In an adult providing the diet is correct, this is not too much of a problem but in a rapidly growing juvenile it can create lumpy uneven growth, peaking of the scutes and weakening of the underlying bone.