Any Amazon Basin Yellowfoot Keepers Out There?

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Bryan

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A very beautiful tort but it seems like it's been pretty hard to come by hatchlings of late, does anyone here keep or breed these torts? As I mentioned in another thread a friend of mine had a beautiful female but she is now deceased. I'm sure that in time he'd like to get at least another Amazon Basin YF and I might just bite as well and try to get 1 or 2.
 

AustinASU

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Only a few people i've seen on here have worked with them. I came close to rescuing a large yellow foot pair.....they may have been amazonian basin's but it was hard to say not knowing where they were taken from. Unfortunately the authorities weren't able to step in on the situation and one of them died in the guys pool...people like that really need a swift kick in the face.





Also for size reference those are regular size wood fence pickets (3.5in wide plus spacing)
 

Bryan

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Thanks for that, that is a beautiful animal. What a shame that the other one died. How big were they? And yeah people like that need a kick in the junk IMO.
 

AustinASU

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This was the smaller one (male) 22in female was around 24-25in


If you plan on getting some i know the turtlesource.com has some available periodically....but i'm not a big fan of how they care for their animals.
 

Bryan

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AustinASU said:
This was the smaller one (male) 22in female was around 24-25in


If you plan on getting some i know the turtlesource.com has some available periodically....but i'm not a big fan of how they care for their animals.



That sure sounds like Amazon Basins to me then. I have seen them listed there but I haven't seen them listed there lately. There used to be another place that IIRC bred them but I lost their bookmark a few years ago when my last laptop crashed. BTW-I haven't heard anything about how they keep their Chelonians at turtlesource, care to share it with me either here or via PM? Thanks, Bryan
 

Bryan

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AustinASU said:
IIRC, i'm not familiar with them

Thanks, I'll do an internet search and hopefully find them again.
 

tortadise

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I have a couple from Peru I got 5 years ago. They were just over 4" when I got them. Not sure and no way of knowing if they will get massive. But they're parents were big. That's all speculation though. Could of been a photo from somewhere else. I do say though they are quite different than my Guyana or Brazilian yellowfoots.
 

tortadise

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The bigger one is Brazilian. Hasd her since 2004. Shes quite large almost 19". And the wee Peruvians are the smaller ones at 5 years old. I would love to believe they will get to be monsters. The weird thing with them is I still cannot get a perfect visual sex on them. They are the size of some WC Guyana medium specimens. But when you flip them over and compare to an unmistakable male or female they show no characteristics of either. One breeds and has flashed so I know I have a male. Im hoping its a pair. Mainly to keep pure Peruvian gene line going. Who knows. Time will tell. I do know some of the largest specimens out there come from Guyana/Suriname though. I have seen some 24-29" monsters come in that people purchased for their own collections. Lots of times they die in captivity though. Unfortunately I Have had that happen recently. Got a 20ish" female. Necropsy was done and her liver was shot. She wasnt huge but still good size.


 

Bryan

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Baoh said:
I have some young ones.

Nice, where did you get them from?


tortadise said:
The bigger one is Brazilian. Hasd her since 2004. Shes quite large almost 19". And the wee Peruvians are the smaller ones at 5 years old. I would love to believe they will get to be monsters. The weird thing with them is I still cannot get a perfect visual sex on them. They are the size of some WC Guyana medium specimens. But when you flip them over and compare to an unmistakable male or female they show no characteristics of either. One breeds and has flashed so I know I have a male. Im hoping its a pair. Mainly to keep pure Peruvian gene line going. Who knows. Time will tell. I do know some of the largest specimens out there come from Guyana/Suriname though. I have seen some 24-29" monsters come in that people purchased for their own collections. Lots of times they die in captivity though. Unfortunately I Have had that happen recently. Got a 20ish" female. Necropsy was done and her liver was shot. She wasnt huge but still good size.



Here's to hoping that the reason that you can't sex them as easily is because they mature at a larger size which would show a distinct difference between them and other yellows. I'm really kicking myself in the butt for not getting a pic of my friends Amazon Basin, she was a real beauty. I had only seen her a few times but from what I remember her scale color and her shell color were nicer than a pair of old WC YF's that another person had.
 

Baoh

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One from Garrett Hartle and one from Jerry Novak. I also have a seemingly Peruvian animal that is a monster of a hatchling from a guy in NJ. I am still trying to find out where, or if, they fit into my plans.
 

Bryan

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Baoh said:
One from Garrett Hartle and one from Jerry Novak. I also have a seemingly Peruvian animal that is a monster of a hatchling from a guy in NJ. I am still trying to find out where, or if, they fit into my plans.

Nice, if you ever decide to move them please let me know. I'm sure that they'd love the weather here! Any idea what sexes they might be? Were they temp sexed? Do Hartle and Novak breed them very often?
 

Baoh

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Bryan said:
Baoh said:
One from Garrett Hartle and one from Jerry Novak. I also have a seemingly Peruvian animal that is a monster of a hatchling from a guy in NJ. I am still trying to find out where, or if, they fit into my plans.

Nice, if you ever decide to move them please let me know. I'm sure that they'd love the weather here! Any idea what sexes they might be? Were they temp sexed? Do Hartle and Novak breed them very often?

Okay, but brace yourself. They are relatively expensive animals.

Largest looks to be female. The smallest is likely to be female. The middle one might be male.

They were not temp-sexed to my knowledge.

Hartle had a difficult time moving them all. Novak sold it to me, but it was produced by a vet with a giant ABYF pair. From what I see, nobody breeds them very often. Sam from Florida Iguana has been seeking an adult male for three or so years for his females. I believe he bought some scoped animals in the last year, but these things take a significant amount of time to mature.

Here are some shots.

101_3049.JPG

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This is the largest ABYF juvenile I currently have. Notice her very irregular prefrontal scales. She has three instead of the standard two. All of her siblings have two. This is the first time I have seen this on a YF of any kind. Just an oddity.

101_2766.JPG


This is the Peruvian animal that came to me from a guy in NJ. It is enormous for its age. Not just in terms of growth, but if you look at its margins for the scutes at hatching, you can see it hatched at a much larger size than normal for YFs I have seen.

I do not think I have any photos of the animal from Novak. I may take some when the opportunity presents itself. You will see that the "look" of its morphology is in line with the first animal shown above.
 

Bryan

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Those are some beautiful animals for sure. Let me know what you'd be asking if you decided to move them so that I know if it's feasible got me or not. I would think that with as many split/extra scutes that your hatchling has that it was probably temp sexed but if the breeder didn't say anything who really knows? How large are the two larger animals? I may end up being better off getting a number of hatchlings from reputable breeders for my friend and I and going about it that way even though obviously it'd take much longer to get breeding sized animals. That female that he raised up was incredible. If I could get locale specific animals that would be my preference especially since these animals seem to be so scarce.
 

Baoh

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101_3135.JPG

101_3136.JPG

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This is the one in the middle, size-wise, from Novak. He graced me with his presence this afternoon.
 

EricIvins

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Ah, the mythical "Amazon Basin" Yellowfoot.....


I don't believe they exist. Yes, we do see large Yellowfoots from time to time. However, I don't think I've ever come across a verified "population" of these animals. Just a few stragglers here and there. Maybe one animal comes in larger than 25" in any given year. Only one has come in from Guyana in 2013 and it was damn near 29" SCL. Yes, I have seen the Peruvian "farmed" animals in person when they came in last. Even had the chance to compare them to Guyana Yellowfoots at that time. I could find no difference between the two. Yes, I have seen the pictures of big Yellowfoots at the farm that supposedly produced them. I have seen pictures of Peruvian Yellowfoots in situ and their sizes were comparable to Northern Shield animals. Take a look at the link -

http://www.understoryenterprises.com/tortoises


With that said - Are there big Yellowfoots endemic to Peru? Maybe. The best detective work I've done into these Unicorns of the Tortoise world place them in the middle eastern parts of Brazil. Again, still no evidence of a population though. Just a few large animals here and there. It will be awhile before anyone really does any type of in situ research on these animals. What I have found isn't much, save for a few pictures of a few large animals being slow roasted on a fire pit over the years...
 

Baoh

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I have interacted in person with one of the giants at the STL zoo. I plan to get around to a more extensive experience one of these days.

She believes in you.

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100_0454.JPG


Those are my shots.

DSC05533.jpg


That is not my shot.
 

EricIvins

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I've seen those pictures, and I've also seen animals larger than that. However, prove to me a population exists and I will become a believer.....


Until then, I will believe these animals exist as aberrations and not any part of a "race" or population......
 

Baoh

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Do you have photos of animals larger than that?

I make no claim to any sort of co-localized wild population. Plenty of regular sized Peruvians and others where these big ones get found and not all of the big ones come from Peru. There are simply giants which do exist. I visited parts of Central and South America last year so I could pretend to be on "vacation" while I got to check out some wildlife. 'Twas a good time.

GeocheloneDenticulata1.jpg


XI7-841790.jpg


Had not come across this breeding photo before. Probably due to mislabeling.
 
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