They are coming up 3 years old
There doesn’t seem to be any bullying going on, the smaller one has always been a lot smaller and we did have her a couple of months after the larger one as the breeder was a little worried she was so small , if anything I’d say she is probably the dominant one, thanks for your reply
Ab friend of mine who has 17 tortoises houses them in an enclosure all together and has not had any problems of fighting or bullying. Naturally, with so many tortoises (Hermann, Spur thigh and Horsefield) she is pretty hands-on and observes them all the time. Providing tortoises have adequate space, it shouldn't be difficult for them to live together. They all shelter in the same "House" too, at night. A clutch of babies she had in 2019 has 'babies' of a marked variety of sizes, yet they were all born at the same time, give or take a day... Not sure why tortoises vary so much as hatchlings form the same clutch though, but there we are...
Groups can do fine, pairs do not. If your friend has groups of the same species together in a large area with sight barriers, etc then yes that can work. Even then sometimes certain ones need to be pulled out and housed alone. In the wild tortoises do not live in groups. If your friend is housing different species together then that is wrong, dangerous and she is not seeing bullying because she doesn't know what to look for.
