How we breed tortoises here at the AZ Tortoise Compound

Turtlemanfla88, sure send over the pics. Last year we had members from the California Turtle and Tortoise Club come take a tour after the TTPG Conference. Anyone that can make it to the TTPG meeting is welcome to stop by afterwards.

We will get another species started on this thread very soon....

I am looking forward to the future posts Pancakes or Box Turtles ?!

this is all great info. publish this into book!

Az tortoise compound said:

Turtlemanfla88, sure send over the pics. Last year we had members from the California Turtle and Tortoise Club come take a tour after the TTPG Conference. Anyone that can make it to the TTPG meeting is welcome to stop by afterwards.

We will get another species started on this thread very soon....

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Yes pancakes and Egypations .

Really great thread, Andy.
But sulking as it's been so long since the last one.
We are greedy for more.

Thanks for sharing!!

What an awesome thread can't wait to see more

ATC, which typs of incubators do you use.

Such great info. Thanks for posting

motero said:

RE: Arizona Tortoise Compound

This is great, I love the location specific info. Great looking torts too.

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um isint that overcrowded dude but nice stock might buy from you when I'm 16

RUSSAIN TORTOISE PLEASE DO DA RUSSAINS WOOOOOH MAN WOOOOH GREAT JOB

awesomecs said:

RUSSAIN TORTOISE PLEASE DO DA RUSSAINS WOOOOOH MAN WOOOOH GREAT JOB

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I thought they already did one

Merrick said:

I thought they already did one

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lol I dint see it

Great information.

Okay, we will get this going again... thanks for the kind words. We will try to get to all the species you guys listed this year.
So, a bit of an update on the previous species we listed already , then on to the next species.

Albinos Sulcatas - We have already covered Sulcata Tortoises and they all are doing awesome by the way. 2015 was our best hatching of Ivories so far! Still two more possible hets to prove out so, each year could be better. Also this past 2015 we attempted to create double heterozygous Ivory/Albino Sulcata hatchlings. (These would be normal looking sulcata hatchlings but would be het for both Ivory and Albino). A good friend sent over a virgin adult female Albino Sulcata to breed with our male Ivory Sulcata. Creating double hets and and raising them to adulthood then breeding them is a long term project but we need our kids and grand kids to be able to have fun with genetics too. So after a few weeks of the virgin Albino being with the male Ivory, she started to nest.... We collect up 18 eggs and rushed them off to the incubators. After a good 100- 110 days or so, we started to have the clutch hatch. Come to find out, all that were hatching were Albinos and no double hets The virgin female, come to find out was not a virgin and must of been mated with one of our friends male Albinos before she got here. So our attempt at double hets for 2015 was a bust...but we are able to claim we hatched the first Albino Sulcata hatchling that was produced from Albino to Albino and breed in Arizona with eggs laid and hatched at our location This wonderful friend does have a couple more young female Albinos and we will be attempting double hets again in the future. We are now offering Albino Sulcata hatchlings each year to the public through our site.Here are some photos to showcase our efforts... First photos are of the female Albino, then the Ivory male mating and finally the eggs hatching.
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Chaco Tortoises - We are very luck here at A.T.C. to be able to maintain this species as well as have an environment that works well for the South American Desert Tortoise, aka the Chaco! Living in Arizona and being use to the native Gopherus Tortoises such as the Sonoran and Mojave, keeping the Chaco is very much identical. This species enjoys warm, dry climates with adequate shading and water reserves. While adult Chacos resemble a small yearling Sulcata, this species is much different. Depending on the locality of the Chaco Tortoise most will grow and top out around 6 -10 inches. Our largest proven female here at the Compound is a young animal and measures 7-8 inches and is in it's second year of laying. All the males in our group are right at the 6 inch mark. The size and colorizations of our group of Chacos makes us think they are the C. chilensis and not the C. petersi, and or C. donosobarrosi. Here are a few photos of the adults.


The last picture posted above is a female Chaco Tortoise nesting.... for this species we have not dug up any eggs to bring into the incubators as of yet. Being so close to the native Desert Tortoises traits and characteristics, and many Chaco Tortoise Keepers having a hard time incubating their eggs, we just leave them in the ground to hatch naturally. Arizona's seasons create a natural diapause cycle for tortoise eggs left in the ground. So if this species needs it or not it is able to do so. So far we have found hatchlings in the enclosures during September when most of the natural hatches occur here in AZ. Pictures below are some hatchlings and also a picture showing what they look like when you spot them in the enclosure.(right before you jump up and down with excitement).

To reply to awesomecs post - "um isint that overcrowded dude but nice stock might buy from you when I'm 16"

Overcrowding can be a huge health risk for tortoises. All tortoises are feces eaters and that is the number one way for them to get each other sick besides basic contact. An over crowed enclosure can also lead to the tortoises water dish getting built up with too much feces and passing along sicknesses. At Arizona Tortoise Compound we maintain a huge variety of tortoise species but most of our groups are manageable numbers. Once some of our tortoises species get setup nicely in a herd or colony setting, we will close that group. Meaning we will not introduce more tortoises into that enclosure, we will start a second enclosure and create a second herd if we need to increase our total number of breeders. Our space limitation is what determines the size of our groups. All species and sub species are housed separately and prevention of cross contamination is always in the fore front of our minds. Even when we purchasing tortoises, from adults to hatchlings, we have to keep them separated from other groups until we are for sure the tortoises are not carrying an hidden pathogens or bacteria's. Most fecal testing is done in house but we do have a close working relationship with a great local veterinarian. Also many of our customers are vet techs, veterinarians, zoos and other organizations that do their own testing once they receive tortoises from us and provide feed back. A lot of the first time tortoise buyers are now taking there tortoises in for a vet once they receive their new tortoise. While tortoises are long lived we always recommend annual vet check ups for your tortoises. Annual preventative care is also done here as well, from fecal testing to de-worming. With most all of our tortoises living outdoors, they go through seasonal and temperature changes. This can play a role on their health depending. We try to be pro-active and think about their needs before they need it. Its always a learning experience and that's what makes tortoise keeping so awesome.

We will touch on the Hermann's Tortoise next and the three sub-species we maintain...

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Hi, great info. What happens when the egg looks like that? Why is it a bad?

That eggs does appear to be "bad". There is black speckling that is around the shell and that is bits of mold. Also with the light shining through you can see a clear separation of the inside contents and the air pocket. If the egg was fertile the black part would be see through with flesh tones and or veining. The black coloration is also mold that took over. Further more, at this stage the egg should have some type of a liquid movement inside of it, the eggs appears to be dried up in the photo you provided. Keep up the good work, hopefully the next set of eggs will be viable for you.

Az tortoise compound said:

That eggs does appear to be "bad". There is black speckling that is around the shell and that is bits of mold. Also with the light shining through you can see a clear separation of the inside contents and the air pocket. If the egg was fertile the black part would be see through with flesh tones and or veining. The black coloration is also mold that took over. Further more, at this stage the egg should have some type of a liquid movement inside of it, the eggs appears to be dried up in the photo you provided. Keep up the good work, hopefully the next set of eggs will be viable for you.

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No, that wasn't my egg. I was quoting your post... Here is the first and third egg of my tort.

This is the second egg, is it okay?


The fourth one should be too early to candle.
1st egg-day 42
2nd egg-day 41
3rd egg-day 38
4th egg-day 3

Oh, I'm with ya. We just recently started hatching Home's hatchlings last year. Normally around the 30 day mark we notice veining on the fertile eggs. Also far, once eggs are laid we place them right into the incubators without cooling them down first. Their hatch rate is about average for tortoises roughly 100 days give or take. We will keep track of our hingeback groups incubation duration and temperatures and create a thread on them as well. Here is a couple photos of some of our hatchlings. The last picture is of a couple of ours and a couple from a friends hatch as well.