Author Topic: OD's Thread O'Tortoise  (Read 26216 times)

OD's Thread O'Tortoise
« on: 13 April, 2012, 02:47:59 pm »
Billy an ex tortoise!  :'(


Harry, aka Vicious Killer Attack Tortoise, will chase anything out of his garden! Got chewed by a dog when he was two. He was given to us when he was 15.


Jessica, a fertile female, very lazy and will, literally, sleep for months, even into spring!


Gogo, a fast mover named by my, then, 4 year old brother. We've had him 42 years and he doesn't get any bigger or slow down!


Harry just chillin'.

mcshroom

  • Mushroom
Re: OD's Thread O'Tortoise
« Reply #1 on: 13 April, 2012, 02:57:55 pm »
Nice pictures. I'll have to see if our Jimmy is walking around when I visit my parents on Sunday.
Climbs like a sprinter, sprints like a climber!

Re: OD's Thread O'Tortoise
« Reply #2 on: 13 April, 2012, 04:39:26 pm »
Nice pictures.
You have to have good panning skills so they don't blur!  ::-)

mcshroom

  • Mushroom
Re: OD's Thread O'Tortoise
« Reply #3 on: 13 April, 2012, 04:44:53 pm »
They can move you know :P

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/53HtpeFEX3Y&rel=1" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/53HtpeFEX3Y&rel=1</a>
Climbs like a sprinter, sprints like a climber!

Re: OD's Thread O'Tortoise
« Reply #4 on: 13 April, 2012, 04:46:52 pm »
They can move you know :P
A cat! Pah! Harry, VKAT, goes for dogs and people!  8)

rogerzilla

  • When n+1 gets out of hand
Re: OD's Thread O'Tortoise
« Reply #5 on: 13 April, 2012, 08:36:58 pm »
I rescued a very large tortoise, unscathed, from the middle of the A689 a few years ago.  It had done a runner from the nearby house.  Must have been 50 years old.
Hard work sometimes pays off in the end, but laziness ALWAYS pays off NOW.

Auntie Helen

  • 6 Wheels in Germany
Re: OD's Thread O'Tortoise
« Reply #6 on: 13 April, 2012, 09:53:43 pm »
Daisy, who lives with my parents, is asleep otherwise I would get a pic of her. She used to have a mate, Fred, but he is no more. It took five days of him not moving for my parents to decide he was dead.

We reckon Daisy is about 90 - they've had her forty years and she wasn't a spring chicken when she arrived.

She was savaged by Lucy my Weimaraner a few years ago - that was an expensive vet bill. Daisy had to be kept awake all winter in a heated box and tube-fed every day. Such fun for my folks. We keep Poppy away from Daisy (when Daisy is awake, of course)
My blog on cycling in Germany and eating German cake – http://www.auntiehelen.co.uk


Re: OD's Thread O'Tortoise - absent tortoise advice?
« Reply #7 on: 10 June, 2012, 03:08:01 pm »
Hello tortoise peeps.

Eddie is a 6yo Hermanns and has gone awol.  Almost certainly still in our garden area uness he's learnt to scale goodly heights and then abseil down the other side, but undetectable by humans, small and large.  The only logical place for him to be is under our shed, which is raised nicely above the (earthen) ground but doesn't have much beneath it to sustain life.

If he's burrowed in and waiting for warmth before venturing out again then he's not picked a bad spot, but here in east central scotland it seems it may now be a while (days into weeks) before anything much warmer than 14/15 max, 8/10 min will be detectable.

Should we fret about him? (we are at the minute - we've only been in charge of him since December, so we're feeling a bit numptie-like) Should we just leave him be?  or should we destroy the shed in a frantic effort to locate him before he perishes?  How likely is it that a Golden Eagle has lifted him away?  or a cat?  No other animals that take entry to the garden, generally.


Re: OD's Thread O'Tortoise
« Reply #8 on: 10 June, 2012, 03:24:10 pm »
Tortoises are good at escaping and, surprisingly, climbing!  :o 
Can you get your arm under the shed and feel around? What's the area around the shed like, can he get through to the other side of it and into open space? Is the shed area good at water run off or does it sit in a bowl and flood? Do you have a dog?

I don't think an eagle, a good Scottish eagle, will see a tortoise and think food rather than rock. A cat might possibly play with it but I can't see it being dragged off and scooped out. Put food out and keep an eye out I think it'll turn up.  :thumbsup:

Our garden is sealed with old roof tiles, brick walls and paving slabs after an escape many years ago. You can pen them in somewhere with a run made of boards, just have open space, some shady area, shelter, water and food, plus grow weeds and nasturtiums. Ours like nastyurchins very much!

Re: OD's Thread O'Tortoise
« Reply #9 on: 10 June, 2012, 03:33:39 pm »
Can you get your arm under the shed and feel around? yeahbut its big - about 3mx4m; have poked torch in and cannot see much...

What's the area around the shed like, can he get through to the other side of it and into open space? yes, and has done so in the past.

Is the shed area good at water run off or does it sit in a bowl and flood? good drainage!

Do you have a dog? - no.

Its just the cold that makes us fret about him, really.  The barrier to the outside world is solid stone walls about 1.5m high, and the gate below, where the height from top of brick to top of board is a good tortoise length, and the bars are too close to fit through without rotating about 75 degrees...




Re: OD's Thread O'Tortoise
« Reply #10 on: 10 June, 2012, 03:46:26 pm »
Ours have been outside, hibernating in their boxes, when temps reach well below 0C. I reckon yours will turn up when he feels warm/hungry enough.

We've trained Harry to cuckoo clock, Swiss, standards and he comes out on the hour and half hour.  ::-)


it's going to rain so they've gone "indoors". Why they share one box is a mystery as they have enough boxen for one each.

Re: OD's Thread O'Tortoise
« Reply #11 on: 10 June, 2012, 05:12:07 pm »
And Lo!
The beast has been located.
As thought, under shed, in the inaccessible far corner, but clearly haven dug himself in and then out again to allow us to see him. If he survived last nights downpour he should be fine until he decides to emerge.
Whew.
Will return here in due course for some garden guidance re tortoise summer camp!
Thanks.

Re: OD's Thread O'Tortoise
« Reply #12 on: 10 June, 2012, 05:17:31 pm »

Re: OD's Thread O'Tortoise
« Reply #13 on: 10 June, 2012, 06:11:31 pm »

Can you get your arm under the shed and feel around?

At least if you don't find the tortoise this way, you'll find the previous house owner's collection of set moustraps....

(but you've found the tortoise, hoorah!)

Which Greek was it, killed by an eagle dropping a tortoise on his head?
If I had a baby elephant, it could help me wash the car. If I had a car.

See my recycled crafts at www.wastenotwantit.co.uk

Re: OD's Thread O'Tortoise
« Reply #14 on: 10 June, 2012, 06:30:55 pm »
Which Greek was it, killed by an eagle dropping a tortoise on his head?
I found this one and his bust seems to show the dent!   ::-)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeschylus

Re: OD's Thread O'Tortoise
« Reply #15 on: 10 June, 2012, 06:58:02 pm »
And the combined angst of 3 girls and a lady led the high priestess and commander of all things magnolian to declare that, once the curry was finished, Eddie WAS to be extracted. Some attempts later, I entered the fray with a spade, dug a hole at the back and undermined him. A warm bath and a heat lamp session later, he can just about be arsed moving his legs a bit.

Looking: (its a visiting backside, not a magnolian one!)
 http://pbckt.com/pu.OwRg7u

Recovery:
 http://pbckt.com/pu.OwOS9k

Re: OD's Thread O'Tortoise
« Reply #16 on: 10 June, 2012, 07:41:12 pm »
Recovery:
 http://pbckt.com/pu.OwOS9k
A splendid example. Are you sure it's an Eddie and not an Edie?

Re: OD's Thread O'Tortoise
« Reply #17 on: 10 June, 2012, 08:25:41 pm »
Um, not at all, now you ask. I thought his certificate would say so?
I'll check!
I'm glad he looks good to you- he is a 'rescue' tortoise as his shell is a little miss shaped owing to poor nutrition in very early years at unknown hands. I think we are his third or fourth custodonians.

Re: OD's Thread O'Tortoise
« Reply #18 on: 11 June, 2012, 10:29:14 pm »
Well his certificate doesn't say boy or girl, but the vet at the royal Dick vet here in Embra said he was a boy, when we took him to have his beak and nails trimmed, and to be basic trained in tortoise care.  and she should know!

Wowbagger

  • Former Sylph
    • Stuff mostly about weather
Re: OD's Thread O'Tortoise
« Reply #19 on: 16 June, 2012, 12:41:57 pm »
Someone I know (and, dolt that I am, I can't remember who) was telling me that they knew of a horse that made friends with a tortoise and that the two were inseparable.

The horse never started at better odds than 200-1 though.
Quote from: Dez
It doesn’t matter where you start. Just start.

Eccentrica Gallumbits

  • Rock 'n' roll and brew, rock 'n' roll and brew...
Re: OD's Thread O'Tortoise
« Reply #20 on: 16 June, 2012, 01:46:45 pm »
When I win Euromillions and get a lovely house with a huge garden, I am going to have a boy tortoise called Malcolm and a girl tortoise called Gloria. Plus donkeys called Bluebell and Idris.
My feminist marxist dialectic brings all the boys to the yard.


Re: OD's Thread O'Tortoise
« Reply #21 on: 23 June, 2012, 11:41:01 am »
Spring greens and strawberries.


What's that smell?


It's here somewhere!


Here it is!


And then Indi found the strawbs and ate most of them.  :facepalm:

Re: OD's Thread O'Tortoise
« Reply #22 on: 08 August, 2012, 12:00:57 am »
Our Eddie has entered a bonkers phase. I think is now 6 going on 16.
He's copping off with every shoe he can find, except my green crocs, that he just fights with. I think we will have to get him a lady friend. He's even making squeaking noises as he fights my shoes.


Re: OD's Thread O'Tortoise
« Reply #24 on: 19 September, 2012, 11:10:19 pm »
Myself and the three magnoliettes went to an evening talk at the Edinburgh (Dick) vet hospital tonight to learn about hibernating the beasts, and about care in old age (tortoise's, not mine). That'll be their problem, not mine, given that Eddie is just 6.
We are now very learned, and impressed by the number of Lothian tortoises - there must have been about 70 people there, representing about 40 tortoises.