True giant yellow foot tortoises

[JTExotics]

I still have the shell View attachment 314471 Here,s another old tortoise that I still have after almost 50 years.View attachment 314472 His name was Schroder and it cost $10 to have him mounted. The guy that did the work swore he would never do another turtle because after he took it apart there was nothing to hook the head and legs back to. Whatever he did he did it right though.

That’s awesome! Would you mind getting some pictures of the shell and straight carapace length? That would be super helpful. Michael and I are putting together a study to finish someday about denticulatus size variation

 

[ZEROPILOT]

LOL, the Pope is a taxonomists.
Anyway, a lot of us have old stories about giant yellow-footed tortoises. The Crandon Park Zoo in Miami had a number of genuinely enormous denticulata up until the late 70s.
When that zoo closed down those tortoises went to the newly opened Metro-Zoo (now Zoo Miami) and were housed along with the Galápagos tortoises. The big yellow-foots were just as large as some of the Galaps, but were more narrow lengthwise and had more of a flat top. Also, they had larger scales on their front legs. As they were perpetually dirty you didn’t see a lot of color on them. Eventually they went away although I have no idea where they went.
Pretty sure that I have some old photos around here somewhere...

Also, D i c k Bartlett used to have a big pair of Peruvian denticulata that raised from juveniles and that were some 30+ years old when I first started visiting him around 1983. They were big, but not giants by any stretch.
PCHP mentioned by Will above, claimed that so called ‘giant’ denticulata could occur in any given population. But I’ve always heard anecdotally that Peru seems to be the place were giants occur more commonly.

I remember that zoo

 

[ZEROPILOT]

There is a place here in Broward county called The Tropic Plants.
It's in Tamarac Florida
It's a nursery with a sort of zoo behind it that you can walk through for a few dollars.
In that area, there are two pair of absolutely gigantic Redfoot. Much larger than any others that I have ever seen.
It seems as if not much is known about them. Except that they are all "very old".
I think these are true Bolivian giants.
Not Yellowfoot. Redfoot.
I'm now wondering if my identification was wrong

If you're ever in the area, they're worth a look for sure.

 

[Blackdog1714]

There is a place here in Broward county called The Tropic Plants.
It's in Tamarac Florida
It's a nursery with a sort of zoo behind it that you can walk through for a few dollars.
In that area, there are two pair of absolutely gigantic Redfoot. Much larger than any others that I have ever seen.
It seems as if not much is known about them. Except that they are all "very old".
I think these are true Bolivian giants.
Not Yellowfoot. Redfoot.
I'm now wondering if my identification was wrong

If you're ever in the area, they're worth a look for sure.

Worth a look- I saw somebodies wedding photo from there on the their Facebook. That is a destination for sure even if you are not into tortoises.