How young is too young for sex?

[TheTortoiseWhisperer]

I bought my red foot from a reptile expo, it's about 4-5 inches long but I have no clue how old it may be as a matter of fact I thought it was a he until today when I got home and saw that my son's friend who also has a Red Foot that he brought over and put them in the same enclosure and by the time I got home the torts got caught doing THE DEED and there was no taking those two apart…I didn't even try just in case it somehow hurts them…..sooooo now I'm a little worried because my tort is small compared to some of the ones I've seen here in pictures, could he have hurt her????

OMG, I'm never going to get use to calling it a "her" the lady that sold "her" to me told me it was a he……There's no chance a it could be male if it was on the bottom, right??? <---I'm thanking God, that I get to ask that question online & not in person) lol

 

[tortadise]

No not really. Males will often try and breed with other males. Especially in the beginning of maturity like the other one is. We can try and sex it for you. 4-5" is on the cusp, but way easier to tell then a hatchling or 3" one. And they are too small to make proper connections. Wont hurt anything, but can stress. Show us a photo.

 

[wellington]

I can't really help you on this one. Except to say, they are probably little too young to say for sure. Also, one of our members had a pregnant Leo and she was small. Probably too young to have eggs and she died trying to have them. In fact if I remember right, she lost two of her females. I wouldn't try to breed until they are actually large enough to.

 

[Madkins007]

Photos would help. However, 'teenaged' tortoises often feel their hormones up and mate or try to mate with anything vaguely tortoise-like.

They also do it as a sign of dominance, which may be the case here- putting two strange tortoises together often means they need to figure out who is top dog here, especially the Brazilian/cherry-head race. Because of this and disease issues we usually would not recommend doing things like this.

 

[ALDABRAMAN]

No not really. Males will often try and breed with other males. Especially in the beginning of maturity like the other one is. We can try and sex it for you. 4-5" is on the cusp, but way easier to tell then a hatchling or 3" one. And they are too small to make proper connections. Wont hurt anything, but can stress. Show us a photo.

 

[TheTortoiseWhisperer]

I forgot to and these yesterday. This is the little tramp that did IT with my son's friend's tort.

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I forgot to and these yesterday. This is the little tramp that did IT with my son's friend's tort.

 

[turtleluv88]

Doesn't look like your pics uploaded. My 2 males boxies will try to mate with each other (which I never allow). In fact the one male even shows a lot of interest in my Red eared slider females who aren't even close to the same size of species. lol