Pellets

[vickit57]

Hi,

I heard somewhere that tortoise pellets are bad and give tortoise's deformaties in their shells. i just wondered if this was true? i give my tortoise a mix of both pellets and fresh greens and He seems keen on the pellets, but i dont want to give him them if they are bad for him.

Thankyou.

Vicki

 

[Tom]

There are only two types of "pellets" that most of us here on the forum agree upon. Mazuri and Zoomed Grassland or Forest Tortoise Food. If its one of those others with the pretty colors, like they use in the chain pet stores, I think most will agree to not use them. They don't cause shell deformities, they just aren't that good for them in comparison to others things that are free, cheap and or easily available.

 

[vickit57]

There are only two types of "pellets" that most of us here on the forum agree upon. Mazuri and Zoomed Grassland or Forest Tortoise Food. If its one of those others with the pretty colors, like they use in the chain pet stores, I think most will agree to not use them. They don't cause shell deformities, they just aren't that good for them in comparison to others things that are free, cheap and or easily available.

thanks for the input Tom, you've put my mind at ease !!

im definatly changing his diet.

 

[Yvonne G]

Hi Vicki:

Welcome to the forum!!

I imagine if you only fed the pellets and nothing else, you would eventually see a deformed shell, but using the pellets WITH greens, it shouldn't affect the tortoise.

When people bring me their turtles and tortoises (I'm a turtle rescue) they usually also bring me whatever supplies they have on hand. I've accumulated quite a supply of off-the-wall food for turtles and tortoises. Nothing goes to waste here. I use whatever they bring me. I would never buy it on my own, but along with a good variety of greens and veggies, the off-the-wall stuff helps fill the tortoises up!

 

[Kristina]

I do the same thing Yvonne, and just use up what I have been brought or at least use it to start transitioning over to better foods.

 

[tortoisenerd]

The tortoise liking a food is a bad reason to buy it. I'd finish up the pellets as part of a varied diet, and then feed only greens and other fresh stuff with a small amount of good pellets like Mazuri or Grassland if you choose to do so (personally I like to keep them to less than 5% of the diet because they are addicting, have additives like D3 and molasses, and higher calorie than a tort would eat in the wild). Nice variety and a good back up plan if you can't get out to buy food in a storm or something. The reason you might hear or shell deformities and pellets may be because of too high of protein in the diet, which was thought to be a main cause of pyramiding (it is now mostly thought that lack of humidity is much more of a leading cause than the secondary causes like too much protein or lack of exercise). Many of the cheap colored pellets are high protein. At one time it was common to feed dog food to vegetarian torts! Some people sadly still do this.

 

[chairman]

I used to use those colored pellets in lieu of vitamins/supplements for my hingebacks. I would press them into bits of fruit/veggies so my torts would eat them while eating their other food. I've still got some left and will continue using them until their gone, but I have mostly transitioned to Mazuri now and won't be replacing the colored pellets. My hingebacks have not had any health concerns as a results, but hingebacks are designed to handle rather large amounts of fruit and animal protein in their diets. My advice, after using those pellets for almost a decade, is the same as others have offered; don't waste what you've got, but only use it as a supplement to "good" food, and if you want to have a stock of dry food on hand for supplementation or emergencies, Mazuri is a good choice. (Note, I also mix in the grassland food for my sulcata, but my hingebacks won't touch the ZooMed food.)