Can anyone tell me if my 12year old female is getting ready for egg laying?

She is in the middle of her wind down and her weight was 925g on the 9/11/12. The last six days all she has done is eat cuttle fish bone some times big chunks at a time. When I weighed her today 16/11/12 she was 975g. Is she ready to lay eggs as she should have lost a small bit of weight by now she hasn't been fed in the last two weeks as she is in the process of her 28day wind down?

Some advice would be appreciated.

I take it she has been with a male. Sorry, but you never know ;)

If she is eating cuttlefish, could she also be eating substrate? Some tortoises have been known to eat soil if the temps are not dropped during winddown. Have you dropped both temp and daylight hours to decrease her mobility?  Is shse showing any signs of being gravid, such as pacing around, sniffing areas with deep substrate or digging with back legs?

Hi there,

and thanks for the reply, yes she has been with a male, temp and lighting has been reduced, also noticed she is always sniffing in the deeper section which is around 8inches, again she has become more active over the last couple of days? The male is in a separate enclosure due to the amount of weight he lost 60 gr over 5 weeks due to continually chasing after the 3 females. So have stopped his wind down period to allow him to regain his weight. The other two females have lost very little weight during the wind down and hardly come out. This is the reason why I have asked for any sort of information from more experienced keepers regarding the behaviour of my female. They are Hermanns Bogetri

Hi there,

checked on her before I started work at 06:00 and she had dug  one hole in the deep substrate which is on a slope. She never did anything but continued to pace up and down all day.