Plants For a Horsfield tortoise

[andybunn]

Hello all tortoise lovers

I'm not a tortoise keeper but my wife is.

I was thinking about getting some plants to put in Felix's enclosure.

What would you recommend for a 2 year old Horsfield tortoise?

Many, many Thanks Felix and Andy

 

[Phil Fishinger]

The tortoise table org website is the best (I believe) but seems offline today. But it has an app with the same name, it will tell if the plant is suitable and also how frequent it can eat that particular plant.

 

[Avuwyy]

I would’ve recommended looking on TTT as well, however, it’s not been working for a few days.

There is a place where you can buy tortoise supplies in the UK called ‘Tortoise Hut’, I get most of my plants from there. They are fine to be immediately fed due to how they’re grown, and they also sell products such as Nutrazu (Mazuri). For some immediate plant ideas, you can look at what they’re selling over there, as they check to make sure the plants they sell are all safe for tortoise consumption.

However, for a short list of what they’re selling right now incase you don’t want to go over there. I’ll plant a few ideas here (There are many more than what are listed here):
- Spider plant
- Boston fern
- Hibiscus
- Campanula
- Forget-me-not
- African violet
- Polkadot plant
- Nerve plant
- Prickly pear cactus
- Peperomia

I’d suggest finding a way to prevent them from being munched down to the root. There are some guards you can place around your plant where you can feed the longer leaves through to prevent the plant being eaten to the ground.

The above are just what I’d consider ‘houseplants’. You can also plant weeds and grasses in the enclosure (Which are closer to the tortoise’s natural diet). You can find some tortoise safe seed mixes on eBay and other sites. Dandelion, plantain, thistles, sainfoin, clover, cornflower, and deadnettle are just a few of the weeds that are safe for tortoises to consume. The site I mentioned sells seed mixes too if you want to poke around there.

Hope this helps! Whenever the Tortoise Table is back up, it may be a good idea to give it a gander.