Just to re-cap, last year I had too much grass and it grew too long, so my Russians were hidden all summer and into the fall and I couldn't find them to gather them up to hibernate indoors:
So during the winter, I got down on my hands and knees (well actually I sat on a low stool!) and pulled up all the grass. Then I replanted, only this time I used a broad leaf mixture of seeds.
This time my mistake was to allow the Russians to have the full use of the pen. Even though I fed them plenty of food, they ate the little sprouts faster than they could grow. So I fenced off the majority of the pen:
And you can see that the seeds are sprouting once again. Naturally, last year's grass had gone to seed and there's a lot of grass coming up too, but I'm going to try to keep it under control so that I don't lose my tortoises again in the fall. I had 15 last year, and only have 12 this year. But!!!!! FAT BETTY'S MAKIN' BABIES!!!!! That's Fat Betty up near the plastic house. Note that I had to remove a couple of the wooden houses because their doors were not big enough. Fat Betty got wedged in the doorway and several smaller tortoises were stuck inside behind her.
So during the winter, I got down on my hands and knees (well actually I sat on a low stool!) and pulled up all the grass. Then I replanted, only this time I used a broad leaf mixture of seeds.
This time my mistake was to allow the Russians to have the full use of the pen. Even though I fed them plenty of food, they ate the little sprouts faster than they could grow. So I fenced off the majority of the pen:
And you can see that the seeds are sprouting once again. Naturally, last year's grass had gone to seed and there's a lot of grass coming up too, but I'm going to try to keep it under control so that I don't lose my tortoises again in the fall. I had 15 last year, and only have 12 this year. But!!!!! FAT BETTY'S MAKIN' BABIES!!!!! That's Fat Betty up near the plastic house. Note that I had to remove a couple of the wooden houses because their doors were not big enough. Fat Betty got wedged in the doorway and several smaller tortoises were stuck inside behind her.