tortoise sense

[terribrown71]

Just wondering...you know how other animals will eat some things (like plants) but won't eat others? Do tortoises have that ability to sense that a plant isn't good for them? My little guy, Arthur, will graze and eat everything in sight but with some plants, he smells them and turns away to go somewhere else. Should I trust his instinct? I still watch him like a hawk when I take him outside for our walks but just had the thought cross my mind. [/size]

 

[Yvonne G]

Hi Terri:

I have always given my tortoises the benefit of the doubt. In my opinion, if they have the option, they won't eat toxic plants. But, if you chop the toxic plant up and add it to his pile of food, he will eat it.

 

[tyler0912]

I agree^

 

[GeoTerraTestudo]

Re: nutrition
Animals (including humans) have what's known as "nutritional wisdom," meaning they can sense via smell, taste, and texture which foods are good for them and which are bad. Toxins may taste bitter or sour, and may have acrid odors, so animals know not to eat them. However, nutritional wisdom does have its limitations, and there are some things animals are good at sensing, and others they're not. For example, nutrients like phosphorus are important but difficult to detect, so animals just eat what smells good for other reasons, or avoid what smells bad for other reasons, and just "hope" that these are good indications of adequate phosphorous content, etc. Some nutrients are also relatively rare in nature, but nevertheless very important, which is why animals crave them. If these nutrients are artificially very abundant in captivity, then the animal may overindulge on them, which then becomes unhealthy. Take proteins, fats, and sodium. These are things animals need, and are adapted to seeking out in nature. In civilization, though, they may eat too much of these things, and develop problems like obesity, cardiovascular disease, osteoporosis, or metabolic disease.

Also, there may be some trial and error involved. Omnivores (like box turtles and humans) may try a bunch of different things, but if something makes them ill (like a plant, insect, or bad meat), and if they don't get so sick that they die, they develop what's known as a taste aversion, which means they remember what made them sick and avoid it in the future. Modern-day pollutants might be odorless and tasteless, or might even smell or taste good, so the animal may go ahead and eat them, only to get poisoned. Obviously, pollutants are so new in evolutionary terms, that only the fastest-evolving creatures like bacteria and insects have much of a clue as to how to react to most of them. So, to answer your question, tortoises are good at smelling what they should and shouldn't eat, as long as there is no pollution involved, and as long as the amount of food they eat is within normal limits.

Re: fighting
Tortoises may be armored, but they are not invulnerable. Their strong beaks make good weapons, and they can injure each other if they want to. If one tortoise bites another hard enough or frequently enough, then he can draw blood. Although that is rarely lethal in and of itself, if the victim has nowhere to run to, then he could become exhausted, or he could develop wounds large enough to get infected, and then he could die. This has been known to happen.

 

[mctlong]

My Russian ate some eggplant leaf out of my veggie garden a couple weeks ago. Eggplant leaf is toxic, but its got big, broad leaves and Russians love plants with big, broad leaves. I've also seen him try to bite into a brightly colored bumblebee transformer toy (maybe confusing the bright colors with fruit?).

I can see torts having a natural instinct to avoid toxic foods, but they don't always know what foods are toxic or inedible until they bite into them. As such, its probably good idea to keep them away from toxic plants.