What do people feed their tortoises on?

Question

I feed my two toroises on Tesco's various mixed bags lettuce and Cos lettuce but wonder if they would like anything more substantial.

Answer 1

Except for the last two responses none of the people who have responded have any idea how to care for a tortoise. Tortoises do not eat cat food or dog food and feeding them such can cause severe organ damage which will result in death.

Tortoises are herbivorous, this means that the need a lot of vegetables, greens, and some fruits in order to maintain a well balanced diet. Tortoises in the wild range over extenive areas, grazing somewhat like cattle do. They are opportunistic feeders in some case and depending on the tortoise they will sometimes eat carrion and mushrooms along with grasses, weeds, fruits, and legumes. Because in the wild they have such a varied diet, their healthy remains much stronger than tortoises that are raised in captivity.

Keepers of captive tortoises have been developing diets and nutrition schedules for tortoises since the very first tortoise was taken from the wild for a pet. We have discovered through trial and error that there are some foods that should be fed in limited quantities and others that in abundance are actually quite healthy. Natural foods such as wild grasses, flowers, weeds, and leafy greens are the best however because of limited access to wild vegetation, most tortoise owners are left to use grocery greens and vegetables to feed their tortoises.

Because the nutritional value of grocery greens has declined over the years this can cause an issue when trying to maintain a well balanced diet. So they key to feeding tortoises using mostly grocery produce is to make sure that you offer a wide variety of foods. The mistake that many first time owners make is that they either feed the wrong foods or they pick one type of food and ONLY feed that one food. Lettuce seems to be the food of choice for most first time tortoise keepers, and while there are many types of lettuce that do actually have quite a bit of nutritional value there is one type that should be avoided completly. Iceburg lettuce has no nutritional value and this can actually starve your tortoises to death.

No matter what the species of tortoise always remember that variety means healthy. Still you should always find out what type of tortoise you have. There are some that can process high sugar foods such as fruits much more readily than others. While all tortoises can have some fruit there are most that can only have fruits as a treat while others can have 10% or more of their diet include fruits. If you aren't sure what kind of tortoise you have then don't worry, just feed healthy foods and only give fruits once a month in small quantities.

I have over 25 tortoises myself and they range from tropical fruit eaters to deaset hay eaters. No matter what species this is the diet that I offer my tortoises. For each dinner they are given no less than 6 different vegetables and greens combined. I also grow weeds and grasses in flower pots to supplement their diet and purchase small bales of hay to mix with their food. You can also buy edible plants such as petunias, impatiens, nashturshiums, poppies, hostas, ice plant, and hibiscus.

This is a list of foods that I offer regularly:

Dandelions (greens leaves and flowers)
Collard Greens
Mustard Greens
Turnip Greens
Kale
Chards
Parsley
Cilantro
Fennel
Wild Plantain
Endive
Escarole
Green Leaf Lettuce
Red Leaf Lettuce
Romaine (in small quantities)
Raddicchio
Winter Squashes
Summer Squashes
Radish tops
Carrots tops
Grated carrots
Ice Plant
Petunia flowers
Hibiscus Flowers
Nashturshiums
White Clover
Red Clover
Shamrocks
Red peppers
Yellow Peppers
Opuntia Cactus Pads
Figs (leaves and fruit)
Yams
Watercress
Grape Leaves

While I haven't listed every vegetable available, these are some really good vegetables and greens that can be mixed with other foods. Remember not every food contains all of the vitamins and minerals neccesary for good health so providing 5 or more different vegetables and greens per day helps keep a tortoise healthy. I do not offer the spring mix greens that the grocery stores sell because the greens are very poor quality and tend to have spinach in them which is not recommended for tortoises.

This link is for bearded dragons however it does show some really good nutritional information for various vegetables and fruits which you can use to examine calcium to phosphorus ratios. Since tortoises need high calcium this is a good list. http://www.beautifuldragons.503xtreme.com/Nutrition.html

For more information and lists of healthy plants and vegetables for tortoises you can go to
http://www.russiantortoise.org
http://www.turtletimes.com
http://www.turtleforum.com
http://www.anapsid.org/mainchelonians.html
http://www.tortoisetrust.org/

Answer 2

What kind of tortoise? Google has plenty of care sheets that will tell you exactly what to feed and how to care for her. Variety is the best thing you can offer her. Each food has different health benefits, and a wide range offers better nutrition. Get powdered vitamins at the pet store and sprinkle it on her food twice a week.

Answer 3

Hi there just been reading through your answers on tortoises diets and i'm really shocked to see no one seems to be giving any correct advise , its quite wrong to be feeding most of the said foods you are all suggesting.
Tortoises are all herbivourous and eat only vegatable matter, in captivity we must replicate this as best we can to be as similar to there wild diet as possible .
Now saying this there are some land tortoises that will eat a wider range of food items than most other types , for example redfooted and hingebacks have some protien in there diet but in general it still should contain a very high % of high fibre green food .
Now most tortoises such as Hermanns , greeks,horsfields, and stars need a very high fibre and low protien rich in calcium diet , the best way of achieving this is to feed a weed diet dandelion and other mixed weeds try this site if you are having any difficulty in identifiying them http://www.tlady.clara.net/id16.htm. also they require huge amounts of dietry calcium in the forum of caclium carabonate (limestone flour) and as much access to natural sunlight as possible through the warmer months of the year if none hibernateing then adequate uvb lighting must in in place, if there are any questions which i'm sure there will be try joining a respectable forum based on tortoise care try these http://www.thetortoisehouse.com/
http://shelledwarriors.visidigi.com/index.php
They give exellent advice on the care of captive land tortoises and make new friends also.
Piglet

Answer 4

all the answers so far are crap, and your tort will be dead in less than half the time it can live and it will suffer all its life, if you would like in depth lknowledge of tortoise husbandry visit the forum:
http://forums.shelledwarriors.co.uk/
or check out sites
http://www.thetortoisehouse.com/
http://www.slowcoach.org.uk/
the best site is http://www.tortoisetrust.org/backidx.html
until then you should feed your tortoise a variety of weeds like dandelion leaves and flowers, and chickweed.
and also holyhock and pertunias. However each species of tortoise differs in its required diet.
you should also only feed your tort once a day to prevent pyrammidding.
Never feed your tort meat or eggs!!!!!
and always provide uv light and heat.

Answer 5

well you can feed him all sorts of things. i have had so many turtles in the past. some from the outside world and some from a pet store. if it's from the pet store then just get tortiose food it is probably allready used to the food it is getting there. if it's an outside tortoise then just feed it some cut up watermellons and some rolly pollies. or fruit, vegetables, i just feed mine on a tooth pick. i know it sounds grows but it works.
hope i helped.

Answer 6

Most people feed them a staple of reptile sticks/pellets and some veggies on the side. You can buy the sticks (which come in bags or jars like fish food) at a pet store or somewhere like Walmart. Good luck!

Answer 7

I've had a pet tortoise my entire life, and my mother feeds her lettuce, tomato, computer and cat food (yes, I did write cat food!!). I'm not sure if she feeds her anything else, but I'm sure everyone else will fill in what I've missed!

Answer 8

This is nowhere near adequate, you risk losing them during hibernation. Please go and buy a care book plus do some research on the Internet .
If you type
tortoise diet
into google you'll get several pages of diet advise.

Answer 9

HI just remember they are not vegetarians.mine eats bold eggs.spam.and the best thing you can feed as i was told by the vet is spinig leaves. as they have allot of iron.you also have a good pet shop food that they can get all the vitamins they need.at the moment mine is made on strawberry's & apples. so i scramble eggs and put them in with it and he loves is food. best wishes with him. sammylee,

Answer 10

You could just feed them cabbage and baby carrots or big carrots. I rescue turtles