Is this a good diet?

[Oliverland]

Oliver my two year old Herman’s tortoise loves his salad though I do want to make sure that it is ok for him to eat this every or every other day? Oliver’s salad varies from day to day so this is mostly what it is: clovers, Romain lettuce, usually kale though I ran out, bib lettuce, red leaf lettuce, dandelion greens and shaved carrot bits. Also every three or so days I feed some sort of pellet including: mazuri tortoise diet, zoo med grassland tortoise diet, and mazuri grassland tortoise diet. Does this all sound ok? This is a pic of what it looks like. There is a little less because Oliver already ate some!

 

[iAmCentrochelys sulcata]

If you feed grocery food feed A lot of variety , add more. Cut down on the lettuce and carrots. Herman’s should be eating Weeds.

 

[Tom]

Best to feed broadleaf weeds, leaves and flowers. If you must use grocery store foods, favor endive and escarole as your main staples. Add in arugula, dandelion greens, kale, cilantro, collards, turnip and mustard greens, and more for variety. To add fiber and variety I would mix in a soaked ZooMed pellet every day to grocery store greens. Go to @Kapidolo Farms and buy some of the dried mix-ins. Will has moringa, clover, echinacea, mulberry leaves, and many many more. If you wet the greens and mix in these dried leaf crumbles, its much better than grocery store greens by themselves.

I'd skip the carrots and cut way back on all the lettuce.

 

[Kapidolo Farms]

The ZooMed foods can be moistened and mixed in. I have a reasoned dislike of Mazuri. There might be ethnic food stores in your area, H-Mart or other asian food stores, they have a huge range of greens. The idea is to have a base of food that is well accepted and rotate many other things throughout the week. This will help if a favorite become unavailable due to season, or recall, shortage, whatever.

Raddicchio is also a domesticated chicory like endive or escarole look at this post, and/or more of the thread, to see what is in these things. . . https://tortoiseforum.org/threads/w...n-published-nutrient-list.161833/post-1541850

For me this interest in tortoise keeping has been a segway into gardening, learning about nutrition, enclosure building, genetics etc. It's been my path to follow for learning. I think this is what it means to 'follow your passion'.

 

[LasTortugasNinja]

Use radicchio sparingly per serving. My tort is an addict and makes a huge mess eating it first, then coming back for other food when he’s satisfied he got it all. I give him radicchio every couple days with a break in between, more as a treat. Torts fixate on foods really fast!

 

[Oliverland]

Thx for all your help! I don’t usually feed this much lettuce most days it is a lot of clover and other weeds. I have never tried radicchio so I suppose I should try that soon! I only add a little bit of carrot about twice a week for some extra water. Again thx for all the help!?