Diet for cherry head

ChrisCherryhead

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Joined
Aug 14, 2015
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I've been feeding my baby cherry head lettuce, watermelon, Timothy hay, and tortoise diet. Is this a good diet??
 

SarahChelonoidis

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Apr 20, 2015
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It's not the best. Lots of great resources here in the red/yellow foot section. Also read through the Tortoise Library: https://sites.google.com/site/tortoiselibrary/species-information/chelonoidis

From there:
Mostly greens and plant matter, some vegetables and fruits, small amounts of protein. Prepared tortoise chows may be used instead or along with fresh foods.
  • Plant materials can be most lettuces, greens, flowers, mushrooms, hays, grasses, leaves or flowers of edible plants such as hibiscus, and leaves of fruit trees such as mulberry. Avoid using only a few items over and over, especially things like spinach, cabbage, and Iceberg lettuces.
  • Vegetables and fruits can include shredded carrot, squash, pumpkin, bell pepper, apples, kiwifruit, etc. Some very good options are figs and papaya. Keep bananas, grapes, and citrus to a minimum. This should only be about 20% of the diet or so.
  • Meats should be about 10% or less of the diet. Live bugs and worms, snails and slugs, lightly cooked eggs, chicken, 'oily fish' (salmon, mackerel, etc.), dog or cat food and so on.
Feed daily. Remove food when it goes bad. One way to help prevent overfeeding is to limit the higher calorie foods (such as fruits and meats) to an amount smaller than the tortoise's head.
 

SarahChelonoidis

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Apr 20, 2015
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Which prepared tortoise diet are you using right now? There are many brands, and not all are created equal.

If you post photos of your tortoise's enclosure, people will be able to give you helpful suggestions there as well. There is so much information out there on proper tortoise care, that it's nice to have a forum of concerned keepers to help out.
 
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