Tortoise food growing kits to grow you own fresh tortoise food. These excellent little kits will give fresh tortoise food all through the growing season (April to September).
Included in the kit is enough edible weed seeds for 4 sowings (more than enough for a years tortoise food), two seed trays to enable cycling of the tortoise food and a propagator top, more than enough compost for four sowings and full instructions.So everything you need to grow nutritious, edible weeds for your tortoise. Simply sow both trays and grow the food. Place one tray in with the tortoise and when it has cropped that one down, replace it with the other one and place the cropped one back in the light to regrow. These grow well in a sunny position indoors or out. Just keep well watered.
The commonest tortoises kept in the UK have similar nutritional requirements. The general feeding information here holds for Horsfield’s, Hermann’s, Mediterranean spur thighed and marginated tortoises. All need a diet that is low in protein and sugars and high in fibre and calcium.
Hermann’s tortoise
In the wild the available tortoise food changes over time. In the spring, when they come out of hibernation there is lush growth of fresh shoots. As the year progresses, especially in the more arid parts of their range, the vegetation gets tough as the heat increases and the climate gets dryer and in some parts of the range the tortoises will aestivate through the heat of summer (hide away and become in active). When the rains come again in Autumn, fresh growth occurs and the tortoises feed up ready to hibernate over winter. It is at this time of year they will also eat fallen fruit, so only for a short period do they eat high sugar food. Wild tortoises will selectively feed on a mixture of lush growth and higher fibre coarse growth to maintain a balance of low protein and high fibre in their diet. Wild tortoise food also tends to grow on underlying rock that is high in calcium and they will even eat small pieces of rock from the soil to supplement that taken up by the plants.
A captive tortoise’s diet should represent that of its wild counterpart and the tortoise food growing kit provides part of that varied diet.
