Hi everyone Hope all hibernations are going well. Not long and we will have our beloved Tortoises running around the garden, munching all weeds in sight, what a nice thought. Hope everyone had a good start to the New Year, and lets hope it is a good one for all of us Have a good week-end Jane, keya & Molly
I went out weed picking this week and managed to get nearly a carrier bag full of weeds, mainly dandelion, plantain, lots of white deadnettle and chickweed, so they are starting to come through now.
Hope this is helpful, be good to hear if others have tried it, regards Vivienne
Re: Touching base Posted: 24/01/2011 by DavidWYork
Hi Jane, and others ...What a rotten winter eh? ...-15 deg c to + 7 deg c here, in just a few days!
I am constantly checking an array of thermometers to ensure parameters are acceptable, so far so good. My torts orts are responding to a press on rear feet, so are alive at least! We now need one of two scenarios: either a cold spell till march, or a sudden early warm spring, and soon. I expect we will get neither, and therefore be stressing over lights, lamps, ambient temperature and food supplies. Not the easiest of creatures are they, but well worth the attention they require!!!!
I'd steer clear of it. There are many so-called whoesome dried foods for tortoise and many lose the necessary nutrients during the drying process. There is the calcium/phosphorus levels to consider and as far as I am aware the calcium level is limited in this partcular dried food. You can't beat natural hand-picked fresh food:-)
Hi Hmm, I am thinking I tend to agree with you Darren, I felt very apprehensive when I gave Keya some, but I was interested to see her reaction, and I was given some to try. She did get stuck in, but stopped eating after a little while. I supose they will eat dried food in the wild like is being suggested, but that will be natural and I am not sure how much processing is involved with the Pre Alpin. I think I will sit on the sidelines and observe whilst feeding the dandies etc. I will have a read of the tabletop findings Jane
I woundered if you had read the link I sent, but there a quite a lot of respected and experienced tortoise keepers now using the dried products. I certainly am going to give them a try, it seems to be a newly emerging change in husbandry with some quite good results!
Yep:-) I've read a bit recently on the new emerging dried foods. My concern is that they are quite new and I wouldn't offer them over fresh foods when available (with med tortoises you can usually find enough). Even though we've quite a few tortoises here we manage to find enough food for them. I can see the benefit of these foods for non-hibernating species, particularly those who like a high fibre diet eg Sulcatas and Leopards, though I would definitely be apprehensive feeding them to young/juvenile tortoises until they have been tried and tested for a while. I guess I'm just old-fashioned and don't like processed foods (unless it's on the way back from the pub on a Friday or Saturday night)
Hi Yes I can see that for leopards, stars etc it could be a good compliment, but for Hermans, I think personally they would choose those fresh dandies everytime. I guess in the wild they would go for the dried debri if that was what was only available, but when the new fresh shoots in spring appear Hmm making my mouth water teehee, I might be tempted later in the day, to sprinkle the herb alpin as a compliment, but not until more research has been done. I know a few people that are using it and their torts love it. I think it will be a personal choice thingy, but will be interesting to see what transpires, just hope it is not to the detriment of the torts.
I've been using the pre alpin testudo products for coming up to a year. They've been produced in Germany for a decade and I think some of the problem is that they are seen as a "pellet" product when they are in fact just dried plants and grasses. These are nutritionally replicant of the kinds of plants tortoises would be eating. They are harvested from the pre alpine meadows of Bavaria, a region where the growing substrate is close to that of the Med. The Bavarian Alps also have a limestone structure leading to a 2:1 Ca:P ratio in the plants. I suppliment the plants as I do fresh feeds. There appears to me to be little to fear from this product. In some respects its nutritionally more accurate than plants grown in our over rich, water heavy soil.
Mixed with fresh weeds it adds fibre that is also sometimes short in the young, green leaves we tend to select for our tortoises.
