Ojai Sulcata Project, Open House

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Tom

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Last weekend Dean and I attended the open house at Dave Friend's Ojai Sulcata Project. In addition to touring Dave's facility, meeting his torts and talking extensively with Dave, we were also treated to a guest speaker. Tomas Diagne of the African Chelonian Institute. I met Tomas a couple of weeks before at the TTPG conference and I had been waiting to hear his sulcata presentation since then.
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Dave and I have started many conversations of the last couple of years and we always seem to get interrupted. He and I both want to provide the best possible care for these tortoises and we both agree that everyone should do their best to share info and increase the knowledge. He and I are at odds on many areas of care for sulcatas and have plans to get together and hear each other out. Now THAT will be an interesting tortoise conversation. I'm sure I will learn a lot.

Dave was a gracious host, the conversation was fantastic, and the "pot luck" food and Dave's burgers were EXCELLENT! Dean and I had a great time. One thing I learned from Dave is that sulcatas can tolerate freezing conditions without apparent harm. He said his leopards cannot. He lets his sulcatas burrow for most of the year, but fills in the burrows at the start of the rainy season (now), so they don't collapse or flood. He has several torts that choose to sleep outside of the provided shelters even when temps are at or slightly below freezing at night. Dave agrees, like most of us, that eating grass and weeds, "pasture" style, is the best diet for them. I'm just starting to get more into this aspect. I'll post on it as I go.
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Tomas' presentation and the conversation we had throughout the day was fascinating to me. So many of us preach about keeping tortoises "naturally" or rail against keeping them "un-naturally", but the bottom line is that NO ONE even knows what "natural" IS for a sulcata hatchling. I keep getting little clues along the way...

Here are some things I learned from Tomas:
1. I have looked up temps for the area in Senegal where they come from, but I don't trust what I see on the internet. I look at how wrong the info is for my own area or how different the climate is from my house to Dean's (around 30-40 miles apart) and I'd much rather hear the generalities from someone who actually lives there and has lived there his whole life. I am waiting for Tomas to reply to an email asking for specific numbers, but he said that there are basically two "seasons" in African sulcata territory in Senegal. "Hot" and "hotter". The rainy season lasts three or four months a year and happens during the "hot" part of the year. It is very wet, humid and many marsh areas form during this time. This is the time of year that sulcatas are up and about and out of their burrows. They breed during this time. The babies hatch during this time. And the females lay two or three clutches, only three weeks apart during this time.
2. I talked about this in another thread, but when I say no one knows what babies do in the wild, I really mean it. Tomas grew up there. He has studied sulcatas since he was a boy. He did not have any answers for me. He has seen a total of three babies in the wild and all of them within the last couple of months. They were in a "marsh" area. He did not see them eat, has no idea where or how they spend their time, and does not know where they go or what they do during the eight or nine month dry period every year.
3. While touring many private tortoise facilities here in CA and in AZ recently, Tomas was amazed at the behavior of our captive sulcatas. Over there they do not just walk around out in the open and come up to people. He said they literally do not come out of their burrows for months at a time. You could walk right by them in the wild and never know it. He said during certain times of the year they are almost nocturnal. You might see them briefly at dawn or dusk, but never during the day.
4. This one blew me away... It seems that toward the end of the rainy season all the wild sulcatas use their shoulders and gulars to collect and drag bunches of green grass down into their burrows. He said they line the entire bottom of their burrows with it and made a hand motion demonstrating a thickness of about a foot. He said they stay down their and eat their collected grass for the 8 or 9 month dry season and by the end of the dry season there is none left. Anyone wanna guess how humid it is in a sulcata burrow with 12" of fresh green grass lining the entire bottom?
5. As part of their breeding and reintroduction plan they rear their hatchlings and babies in very large "natural" pens. In the beginning he had many problems with their eyes being too dry and either getting infected, crusted shut or just not opening, and babies not thriving. He began irrigating the pens which created more humidity and green growth and the problems disappeared immediately. This step is not necessary with with juveniles, sub-adults or adults.
6. Pyramiding does not exist in Tomas' country.

Here are some things that we must still learn that Tomas is working on:
1. Distribution and range size. How big is their territory and how far do they travel? When do they travel?
2. They are extinct in at least two whole countries within their range. There are only around 40 left in Senegal, not counting Tomas' reintroduced ones. The populations in the rest of their natural range are in dire need of assessment. This is not easy. It is very dangerous to travel in some of these areas, even for a native African. Tomas told me that I would surely disappear if I were to go to some of these places.
3. EVERYTHING about babies.
4. Tomas installed telemetry in several of his reintroduced sub-adults and has been compiling data since 2006. He is in the process of organizing this data and publishing it.

Dave and I will be meeting sometime soon and I'll share what I learn from him. Tomas and I intend to stay in contact through email and hopefully he will not get tired of my endless questions.
 

dmarcus

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Wow I bet that was a very nice place to visit and enjoy some great conversation...
 

CtTortoiseMom

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That is great Tom, great pic's what a cool place!!
 

Katherine

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So amazing! Thanks for sharing this with us; it's a shame it's so dangerous there because it would be so awesome to be able to see and learn from them in their natural environment! Sounds like hearing it from Tomas will be the next best thing, really appreciate you sharing your seemingly never ending wealth of tortoise information : )
 

Neal

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Tom said:
One thing I learned from Dave is that sulcatas can tolerate freezing conditions without apparent harm. He said his leopards cannot.

Of course I have to question this since leopards are undoubtedly the best and strongest types of tortoises of all. :p

Is this because of the burrowing behavior of sulcatas, or are we talking adults that sleep out in open fields?
 

Shelly

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Tom said:
no one knows what babies do in the wild, I really mean it. Tomas grew up there. He has studied sulcatas since he was a boy. He did not have any answers for me. He has seen a total of three babies in the wild and all of them within the last couple of months. They were in a "marsh" area. He did not see them eat, has no idea where or how they spend their time, and does not know where they go or what they do during the eight or nine month dry period every year.

At what age (size) do they become more visible in the wild?
 

Tom

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Neal said:
Tom said:
One thing I learned from Dave is that sulcatas can tolerate freezing conditions without apparent harm. He said his leopards cannot.

Of course I have to question this since leopards are undoubtedly the best and strongest types of tortoises of all. :p

Is this because of the burrowing behavior of sulcatas, or are we talking adults that sleep out in open fields?

These were 9-24" sulcatas that were sleeping above ground since the burrows are all filled in for winter. When I asked him if the leopards also tolerate this cold, his reaction was noticeable. It was almost as if something startled him and he replied, "Oh no. The leopards need to be kept warmer.", with a deadly serious tone and look in his eye.



Shelly said:
Tom said:
no one knows what babies do in the wild, I really mean it. Tomas grew up there. He has studied sulcatas since he was a boy. He did not have any answers for me. He has seen a total of three babies in the wild and all of them within the last couple of months. They were in a "marsh" area. He did not see them eat, has no idea where or how they spend their time, and does not know where they go or what they do during the eight or nine month dry period every year.

At what age (size) do they become more visible in the wild?

When I have asked other people this question who have been to wild sulcata territory they usually say 10-12" is the smallest wild one they have seen. From what Tomas says, they really are not very visible in the wild ever.
 

Neal

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lol...how dare anyone suggest such a thing I know...but, there are also stories on the opposite end such as one my vet told me of a leopard he observed in the wild that was walking around with frost on its shell.

As far as I'm concerned it really doesn't matter, but from a skeptical point of view, I need more questions answered before I can really make any implications. I don't know much about genetics and biology, but I can't understand what makes these tortoises so genetically different (besides behavior and size) that they can withstand colder temperatures than the other.

With that said, I'm curious as to the extent of his observations...as in did he observe several adult leopards out in the same conditions, and did they all end up dead? What was the health status of all adults observed? What were the feeding habits before each tortoise was observed? etc....

(Sorry, I don't want to detract from your thread, maybe we could start a new thread if you don't want this topic here?)
 

StudentoftheReptile

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Perhaps it has something to do with size. I seem to recall reading something a long time ago about larger reptiles able to retain body heat longer. The trade-off being that it takes a little longer to warm up and acquire that heat (i.e. energy) from the sun. Hence why you see larger herps like crocodilians and tortoises spending more time in the sun during the day.

Apparently sulcatas can withstand chilly temps. What about the galaps and aldabras? How low can they go? Maybe size isn't a factor...
 

Tom

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I don't mind Neal. Any tortoise discussion is good discussion as far as I'm concerned. I too have heard the frost stories. I guy I know was hunting in SA and one frosty morning a leopard just came walking through their camp. I have been noticing that my leopards and others that I have seen both here and in Africa seem to be very early risers. When I talk to Dave again, I will ask him about more details about why he thinks the leopards cannot be kept as cool as the sulcatas.

SS, it does not seem to be a size thing since some of the sulcatas sleeping outside were fairly small. Smaller than an adult leopard anyway. Dave explained to me that he thinks gut fermentation of long fibered plants (grass) helps to warm them from the inside. He explained how even when their carapace temps very low, they are much warmer if you reach under and feel their plastron. I have noticed this in my animals, but I attributed it to the sulcatas body insulating an area that was warmer during the heat of the day, thereby preventing as much heat loss from the ground in that one spot.
 

DeanS

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Here's some GREAT info on Dave and his place!

website:
http://ojaisulcataproject.org/

story:
http://www.vcstar.com/photos/galleries/2011/feb/28/african-tortoises-find-friend-friend/

video:
http://www.vcstar.com/videos/detail/a-tortoises-best-friend/[hr]

...and, I've thrown this link in the past, but this is still the BEST info out there on Tomas...
http://rolexawards.com/en/the-laureates/tomasdiagne-tortoisesacrossafrica.jsp

and there is the direct site link to his Tortoise Village in Senegal...
www.villagetortues.com
 

Shelly

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Question... if hatchlings are never seen in the wild, how were the initial hatchlings collected for the pet trade? Were they collected as eggs?
 

jeffbens0n

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Shelly said:
Question... if hatchlings are never seen in the wild, how were the initial hatchlings collected for the pet trade? Were they collected as eggs?

Sub-adults to adults were collected.
 

DeanS

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Yeah,! The BCC is about 8 miles north of Dave's place. In fact, that's where Tomas was staying while in CA.
 

Laura

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when i saw Open House.. i thought we were all invited... darn..
So.. i notice they house lots together.. do they have problems with that? males only?
also,, his fences.. do they push thru them?
 
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