To wake up or not?

[Shakudo]

Hi everybody,

I would like some thoughts about this.

As some of you have read my Russian tortoise has been getting more and more inactive over the months. Eventually she didn't eat anymore and dug herself in completely.

She has been sleeping for exactly 5 weeks now, and I am wondering to wake her up or let her be.

I have no way of lowering temperatures enough for actual hibernation, but it seems she felt like doing it anyway. My light is off except for a small 3 watt LED light.

She hasn't been digging for a few weeks now. And I am worried, but also thinking it might be better to let her sleep. I can't and won't force her to stay awake/eat for me. I can't stop her from doing what she does out of biological imperative.

She buried herself in her night/hide box in a layer of 25 cmters deep coco coir.







Joey

 

[peasinapod]

if you can't give your tortoise the adequate temperatures for hibernation you have to wake it up. Doing some sort of half-way thing will only harm your tortoise. At room temperature I'd be way too worrie about the metabolism being too active. I'd wake her up and keep her active. You can always prepare a fridge or something similiar for next year.

 

[lismar79]

Mine has been doing the same thing & I do not have a hibernation appropriate set up for her so Every day I dig her up in the morning & place her under her basking light. Then in the evening I soak her under her light & then hand feed her so she eats. This has been going on for over a month & within the last week she has started to eat on her own & bask on her own.

 

[Shakudo]

Well, it was like she knew!

I had decided already and after reading the confirming comments, I wanted to wake her up.

When I opened the night box she was just sitting there, on the surface!

It was like she knew, I'm so astonished!!!

She lost a bit of weight but nothing like when I just got her. So I'm not worried she is fine.

I have a big soup pan ( no pun intended) and am currently soaking/hydrating her in warm water.

I'm going to run to the store now to get greens and offer her food!!

I'm so happy! I missed her so much.

 

[Tom]

if you can't give your tortoise the adequate temperatures for hibernation you have to wake it up. Doing some sort of half-way thing will only harm your tortoise. At room temperature I'd be way too worrie about the metabolism being too active. I'd wake her up and keep her active. You can always prepare a fridge or something similiar for next year.

Well said.

 

[Shakudo]

Of course.

 

[Tom]

Here is a reply I did for someone else's thread yesterday about this subject. Maybe it will help you too Joey.

"They will not be able to hibernate at room temp. Its too warm. You will need to decide to either keep them up, or hibernate them properly. Right now they are in a bit of a "limbo", and that is not good. I've used the following methods for dozens of DTs from babies to adults, as well as many other tortoise and reptile species that come from areas with a natural hibernation period.

While I have kept hibernating species awake through winter and I know others have successfully done it too, it is my opinion that species that hibernate in the wild should also hibernate in captivity. It just needs to be done correctly. Leaving them outside to figure it out and deal with the rigors of winter in the small spaces (like backyards) that we stick them in, is not my idea of doing it "correctly". I know far too many that have died this way. Don't let these horror stories from people who did not properly prepare, or hibernate their animals in a safe, controlled way, scare you. Hibernation is totally natural and totally safe when a few simple guidelines are observed. Simple Guidelines:
1. Bring them down, and up, gradually.
2. Make sure their gut is empty before dropping temps. Two weeks of no food with the normal warm temps should do it.
3. Make sure they are well hydrated by soaking them, before and after hibernation.
4. Make sure the temperature is consistent and cold enough for the entire hibernation time.
5. Don't let them do it in a self dug burrow in your backyard. NOT safe!

To keep them up: You will need to keep them warm, day and night. The enclosure needs to be nice and bright too, so add a 6500K florescent tube, if need be. I set lights to come on an hour or two before the sun comes up and stay on for a good two hours after the sun goes down. Daily warm soaks, or every other day, seems to help convince their brains that its not sleepy time. I would still give them outside time all winter long as long as its sunny and warm-ish. The sun really helps and we have such nice mild winters here in SoCal.

To hibernate them: The dangerous parts of hibernation (flooding, burrow collapse, rodents, temperature extremes, etc..) can all be eliminated by bringing them inside into controlled conditions and prepping them correctly. While they have adapted to survive these conditions out in the wild for millennia, our back yards are not the wild. Not even close. The shallow burrows they construct in our yards are not enough to protect them from the whims of a cruel mother nature, and as Yvonne adeptly pointed out, many of them don't survive hibernation in the wild, or outdoors in captivity either. I have hibernated all ages of DTs using the following methods: It is often said that "tortoises do better outside". True some of the time in some instances, but not all of the time in all instances. Most babies actually do better inside most of the time. As such, when night temps really start to drop, as they did about two weeks ago, I bring small hibernating species of tortoises inside to their indoor set ups every evening. I feed them up for a good two or three weeks, and soak them daily or every other day. Then I leave the timers and heat and everything on and running, but I quit feeding them. I give them around two weeks with no food, daily soaks, and warm day time temps, as usual. After those two weeks, I start adjusting the light timers down and raise the fixtures a bit to lower basking temps. I let night temps drop as low as is practical for indoors. I'll do this for another week or two. Then I put them into their individual hibernacula. I use plastic shoe boxes, or something similar, with a couple of inches of substrate on the bottom. I keep them dry at this time. In the past I've used non-functioning fridges or freezers laid on their backs in a cool area to keep the shoe boxes in. Currently the floor of my garage stays around 50-55 all winter and I've used that for the last few years. The problem is that we keep having these weird warm winters with daily highs in the 80s or 90s sometimes, for days or weeks on end. Good for my non-hibernating species, but not so good for the hibernators. This year I'm getting them a dedicated fridge, so I don't have to worry about the weather and I won't have to try to fight the temperature outside. I'll set it to around 45 degrees F. I let first timers go for 8-10 weeks under these controlled conditions. Older ones will go for 12-16 weeks. I watch the temps, but I don't mess with them during hibernation. When the weather starts to warm up, I gradually warm up the fridge and let warmer air into the hibernation area, and at some point after a few days, I pull them out, soak them in shallow room temp water, and put them back into their indoor enclosures with no heat. Just room temp. I soak daily for a bout two weeks. After a few days, I will turn the lights on. I leave the fixtures at their higher adjustment at first and gradually, over the course of a few days, lower them back down to get the right basking temps. After the tortoises activity level comes up, and they start moving around more, I will begin offering food, and letting them run around in their outdoor pens on warmer days, but I still bring them in to escape the cold nights. For older/bigger tortoises that can't come back inside, I simply use an outdoor heated night box to do just about the same thing. The night box more or less takes the place of the indoor enclosure and gives me a way to keep them warmer at night while preparing for hibernation or coming out of it.

The above methods have worked perfectly for me for many years with a wide variety of reptile species. The only time I ever lost an animal during hibernation is when I took the advice of a very knowledgeable man, who didn't understand our climate, and let my tegus hibernate outside as he did in his climate. I lost two out of three that year. It was heartbreaking.

I don't have set dates for any of this, and I sort of go by "feel" and the weather on either end of hibernation. If we have a long summer with a warm fall, I wait longer to put them down. If we have an early spring, I wake them up sooner. Generally I try to get them down by December, and get them up sometime in March.


I know that is a lot to read. Please feel free to ask lots of questions. We will help you, whichever way you decide to go."

 

[Shakudo]

Thank you Tom, that's a nice piece of info and I will certainly take the time to study it.

My tortoise woke up out of herself....

Just the last two weeks I have had the MVB off to lower the temperature.
But I live in a city apartment so that's very hard to do.

Today I just put on the light, after deciding to wake her. And after an hour or so.... I just found her sitting at the entrance of her burrow.

She is soaking now but no urates or feces. I made sure before I let her sleep that she was completely empty.
Though I mustn't take credit because she stopped eating a while before that and she didn't give up anything then either.

I am really curious to see if she is going to eat and if she is going back to sleep after.... Like the previous times.

 

[Tom]

I am really curious to see if she is going to eat and if she is going back to sleep after.... Like the previous times.

You can influence this by manipulating environmental factors like light duration and temperatures. Daily soaks seem to help wake them up and keep them up too, if that is the goal.

 

[Shakudo]

Hi everybody,

Here is a small update.

She is doing fine I tried to keep her awake with everything I got but she insists on digging herself in, every time and no matter what.

Look, I am honestly appreciating all the info and tips. And I certainly don't want to argue or debate whether or not I am doing the right thing. But I have tried everything but she wants to sleep. And I have let her for about 1 1/2 months now.

I strongly believe that if I force her to stay awake, every day, I will create more stress and harm because I am fighting against her natural imperative.

I have kept all heating off and lighting to a minimum with a 3 watts LED bulb for a day and night rhythm.

The last few days she was digging around, I heard her and observed this 2 days. Today I switched on the MVB and after a few hours she dug herself out... And was basking.
Just like the previous time almost in exact synch with my actions.

I took the opportunity to check the surroundings for feces and urates and there were none. She is urrently soaking/hydrating. I will see if she is up for some food.

She has lost exactly 1 gram.
She doesn't have any sign of dehydration. And now even after half an hours soak, she hasn't produces any feces and/or urates.

I am closely monitoring her and will continue to do so. But I am convinced at this moment that she knows what she is doing.

I will continue to keep and eye for her and will wake her if necessary but I will not force her to stay awake.

This is what works for us. And I just wanted you guys to know that she is quite fine and doing good.


Joey

 

[stinax182]

You don't have to force her to stay awake, just wake her every couple days and offer food and bathe her. If she buries herself instead of eating, that's fine. The problem with half hibernating is that anything higher than 50°f will cause her metabolism to be normal but without food, she will use up her reserves. 1 gram in two months is nothing but you must monitor it and wake her every couple of days. And if she were in the wild, she would have been preparing for hibernation months ago. Maybe you should consider researching burmation and give it a try in a couple years if she is like this.

Don't stress it too much. If she's hydrated and not losing weight, she's good.

 

[Shakudo]

You don't have to force her to stay awake, just wake her every couple days and offer food and bathe her. If she buries herself instead of eating, that's fine. The problem with half hibernating is that anything higher than 50°f will cause her metabolism to be normal but without food, she will use up her reserves. 1 gram in two months is nothing but you must monitor it and wake her every couple of days. And if she were in the wild, she would have been preparing for hibernation months ago. Maybe you should consider researching burmation and give it a try in a couple years if she is like this.

Don't stress it too much. If she's hydrated and not losing weight, she's good.

Thank you. I do stress about it sometimes, and she is always every day on my mind.

Well, you didn't know of course, but actually she has been like this for a few months from August.

We had a major change in climate from very, very warm, to suddenly very cool and then she started to dig and dig even before our fall season begun. She stopped eating almost completely. So I guess she was already preparing then. I haven't offered her food since then.
And when she woke once in the end of October she ate a few leaves and went back to sleep.

I think she sudden climate change influenced her in a way I can only theorize about.

She seems to manage like this, without any harm and if there is one thing I know about my tortoise, it's that she is very, very headstrong.

What you may know about me, is that I am also very strong willed and driven when it comes to what I am passionate about

I have read a lot about brumation online and in purchased literature.

The only way in my living conditions to brumate her is by fridge method. And I won't do that until I am absolutely sure I want to venture that way. Also, I am in a personal situation that I can't afford/nor have space for another fridge and need space for my food in my own fridge.

You may be certain I watch over her and keeping her under close eye. She is like a part of my family to me.

Thank you for your input friend much appreciated!

Take care,

Joey

 

[stinax182]

She's in great hands then

 

[Shakudo]

She's in great hands then

Thank you

 

[Yellow Turtle01]

May I offer a recommendation? She might soak herself more and more deeply if her dish was bigger!

 

[Shakudo]

May I offer a recommendation? She might soak herself more and more deeply if her dish was bigger!

Thank you
Yes.... At the next reptile expo I will look into that. I am going for a large dish I now have plenty of room for that.


Today is a new day and she was sitting in a corner just now. Took her out for a soak and will offer her food again when she is done.

Hopefully she will eat more then yesterday. Which was just a few leaves


Thanks again

Joey

 

[Shakudo]

And did eat a lot more today I now also give her reptivite it is a multivitamin powder with calcium, d3 and all other beneficial vitamins and minerals. I chose this because I'd rather give a broad spectrum then just the calcium with D3 though it works fine too.

I just feel better knowing she gets more of her necessary goodies in her with her food

 

[Shakudo]

Some pictures I took today

(Note: the dried oak leaves have been removed, after doing research I read that they contain toxic properties, source: thetortoisetable.org.uk)


















Take care,


Joey

 

[Shakudo]

She's still out and about and her appetite is picking up again. Lovely to see her moving around again. It felt like ages.

 

[Shakudo]

Still eating like a horse. Very active and gaining weight Happy! And exploring her new surroundings. She went to sleep just after it was finished. And she is looking around like a kid in a candy store the vivarium is 170cmx60cmx70 (lxbxh)
66,9 inches x 23,6 inches x 27,6 inches