Food Prep Tools/Tips/Tricks

[KleinmannCrew]

Hey everyone! I'm looking for any preparation tips, tricks, and tools that you all have found helpful in preparing food for a larger number of tortoises.

I've read through what/how others prepare (examples in the sticky), so clarifying that I'm more so looking for anything you've found to help make things efficient.

Im thinking of kitchen tools, storage containers, and anything else related to prep that you've found useful!

 

[Yvonne G]

i prepare food for about 40 Tortoises daily. Naturally, when grass and weeds are growing food prep is at a minimum, but during the winter I buy groceries to last a week - 7 bags of greens (turnip, mustard, etc.), 7 bags of Santa Barbara salad (endive, escarole, radicchio), a case of romaine, 7 heads of green leaf lettuce, a big bag of kale, some bell peppers, bok choy, cactus, cucumber, zucchini, and whatever else strikes my fancy. I wash all this as I'm putting it in the fridge. I bag up the romaine three to a bag.

On a daily basis I set a big plastic bushel basket in the kitchen sink and dump in a bag of greens, a bag of Santa Barbara, a couple big handsfull of kale, a bit of cactus or whatever, three heads of cut up romaine, a head of cut up green leaf, and whatever leaves or weeds are available.

Then I reach both hands down to the bottom of the bushel basket and give it a bunch of good stirs.

For babies I use all of the above but I chop it up in bite size pieces, adding dried bits bought from Kapidolo Farms, vitamins and a bit of calcium. I chop enough to last three days. Any longer and it starts to turn to mush. For babies I use a cheese grater on the zucchini.

When I feed the tortoises I bring the hose with me and clean the waterers at the same time. I also have a big dust pan with a long handle and I pick up poop at the same time.

Lights and heat are on timers.

 

[jsheffield]

I got a really big salad bowl, 40 quarts, which makes food prep for my 13 torts much easier.

Jamie

 

[SinLA]

I only have one, but I use plastic storage bins, line them with paper towels, spray down the towels and then put them in the fridge. Most things last a shockingly long time that way... Dandelion Greens (which he seems to hate anyway) are the only thing that go bad quickly

 

[Tom]

I need about three five gallon buckets of food a day right now.

This time of year with the rain and all the weeds, its all scissors and buckets for me. Like Jamie with his salad bowl, I use 40 gallon tubs, 18 gallon tubs, and 5 gallon buckets to collect and mix up my weeds and grasses. I find a nice weed patch, grab a handful with one hand, cut with my heavy duty scissors with the other, and then drop it in the bucket. For my smaller torts, I hand pick individual leaves and buds to make sure I don't have too much stem material. I'll usually have two buckets for weed collection. One for the smaller stuff, and one for the "rough cut" stemmy stuff for the bigger tortoises.

Soon the weeds will die off and dry up, and then I will be using loppers and a pole saw to cut mulberry branches, or a knife and bucket to collect spineless opuntia pads, or hand clippers for grape vines, or my scissors and bucket to collect the weed seed mixes I grow.

In fall when the mulberries drop their leaves, and the opuntia go dormant, I start ordering cases of endive or escarole to get me through until the rains come and bring the weeds back. I mix in soaked horse pellets and the Kapidolo Farms dehydrated options to add fiber and variety.

My food prep is seasonal.

 

[KleinmannCrew]

Thank you all! Im always curious to learn from others, and I'd say these are all great tips! Appreciate it (And honored to hear from so many TF legends too )