• Posted 12/19/2024.
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    I am still waiting on my developer to finish up on the Classifieds Control Panel so I can use it to encourage members into becoming paying members. Google Adsense has become a real burden on the viewing of this site, but honestly it is the ONLY source of income now that keeps it afloat. I tried offering disabling the ads being viewed by paying members, but apparently that is not enough incentive. Quite frankly, Google Adsense has dropped down to where it barely brings in enough daily to match even a single paid member per day. But it still gets the bills paid. But at what cost?

    So even without the classifieds control panel being complete, I believe I am going to have to disable those Google ads completely and likely disable some options here that have been free since going to the new platform. Like classified ad bumping, member name changes, and anything else I can use to encourage this site to be supported by the members instead of the Google Adsense ads.

    But there is risk involved. I will not pay out of pocket for very long during this last ditch experimental effort. If I find that the membership does not want to support this site with memberships, then I cannot support your being able to post your classified ads here for free. No, I am not intending to start charging for your posting ads here. I will just shut the site down and that will be it. I will be done with FaunaClassifieds. I certainly don't need this, and can live the rest of my life just fine without it. If I see that no one else really wants it to survive neither, then so be it. It goes away and you all can just go elsewhere to advertise your animals and merchandise.

    Not sure when this will take place, and I don't intend to give any further warning concerning the disabling of the Google Adsense. Just as there probably won't be any warning if I decide to close down this site. You will just come here and there will be some sort of message that the site is gone, and you have a nice day.

    I have been trying to make a go of this site for a very long time. And quite frankly, I am just tired of trying. I had hoped that enough people would be willing to help me help you all have a free outlet to offer your stuff for sale. But every year I see less and less people coming to this site, much less supporting it financially. That is fine. I tried. I retired the SerpenCo business about 14 years ago, so retiring out of this business completely is not that big if a step for me, nor will it be especially painful to do. When I was in Thailand, I did not check in here for three weeks. I didn't miss it even a little bit. So if you all want it to remain, it will be in your hands. I really don't care either way.

    =====================
    Some people have indicated that finding the method to contribute is rather difficult. And I have to admit, that it is not all that obvious. So to help, here is a thread to help as a quide. How to become a contributing member of FaunaClassifieds.

    And for the record, I will be shutting down the Google Adsense ads on January 1, 2025.
  • Responding to email notices you receive.
    **************************************************
    In short, DON'T! Email notices are to ONLY alert you of a reply to your private message or your ad on this site. Replying to the email just wastes your time as it goes NOWHERE, and probably pisses off the person you thought you replied to when they think you just ignored them. So instead of complaining to me about your messages not being replied to from this site via email, please READ that email notice that plainly states what you need to do in order to reply to who you are trying to converse with.

Baby Sulcata diet

MDC_Ophiuchus

MDC_Ophiuchus

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Okay, my little squirt is starting to get picky.

He used to eat kale and pre-mixed Spring Mix salad fairly well, along with grated/sliced veggies (zucchini, squash, carrots, and apple).

In addition to those, he occasionally will eat the Exo-Terra tortoise pellets and the Nature Zone Tortoise Bites (orange, gelatinized cubes). I'm typically not a huge advocate of commercial diets, but I also believe in variety, so I only offer these infrequently.

My major concern is that he rarely if ever nibbles at his hay. Right now, I offered orchard grass, since I've heard/read that it is easier for juvenile tortoises to chomp on compared to the other hays. But I think in the 2 months I've had him, I've seen him nibble a hay stalk twice.

Now...he has begun to avoid the kale or salad. I decided to try bok choy. He kinda liked that at first, but has since is like, "meh" about it.

I have also tried other commercial diets, such as ZooMed Grassland tortoise diet and Rep-Cal Tortoise diet (looks like mini Trix cereal). Absolutely refuses ZooMed, and will occasionally nibble at the Rep-Cal stuff.

I really would like to get him back on leafy greens and hay. Any suggestions?
 
I wouldn't be worried that your baby sulcata isn't eating any hay. It is very difficult to get a sulcata smaller than an adult to eat hay. Leafy greens are a great diet for a baby/juvenile sulcata. If you must have the tortoise eat hay, chop it finely and dust food that your tortoise will eat with the hay "dust."
Your tortoise probably isn't interested in his greens because most commercially available diets contain appetite stimulants... i.e. sugar of some variety. Let's face it, your asking your tortoise to switch from donuts to broccoli; you're going to butt heads on this one. My recommendation is to soak the pellets into a mush and mix it with greens. Special note, you're probably going to want to avoid kale during this process as it isn't the tastiest stuff in the world. Eventually you'll be able to reduce the amount of mush until you're not using any at all. At that point I would quit using most of the pellets you have listed. I would throw away (or feed to an appropriate insect colony) those gel cubes right now.
To get your tortoise to eat the zoomed grassland food, just rehydrate it. My tortoise loves the stuff when I offer it.
Once you've gone through your current pellet stock and are looking to replace it, I would look into Mazuri tortoise food or the zoomed grassland food in bulk. I use mazuri because it is well-established in the tortoise community and I can buy 20# bags of it locally. I would use the grassland as well if I could buy the bulk bags as it just isn't economical to blow $8 on a tiny bin of food that might last my sulcata a couple weeks.
Aside from that, keep him hot and humid and he should be just fine.
 
Thanks for the tips.

He is starting to munch down the bok choy more, along with his grated veggies.

I'll definitely try mushing up the ZooMed stuff. Acquiring the Mazuri diet has been on my agenda. Just no local stores carry it and I'll admit, I've been procrastinating on ordering it online (mostly from lack of sufficient funds).

The orange cubes I stop feeding, but I may keep them around for the very rare treat. I honestly I've been cutting back those already since he's started going after veggies more. (I think its been at least over a week since he's had any!)

My normal feeding regiment is typically a generous helping of greens and veggies in the morning. If I catch him roaming around his enclosure a lot when I get home from work, I may throw a few more veggies and some pellets.

Here's a pic of his habitat. An old 36"x42" tank with a infrared bulb and a MVB Solar Glo.
IMG_2368.jpg

IMG_2364.jpg
 
Any place that sells purina can get you mazuri. However, how they're willing to do that varies widely. I have a tractor supply near my house that offered to order mazuri for me if I was willing to purchase an entire pallet of 25# bags. I have a feeder's supply that orders for me by the bag, but it takes a solid month or two to arrive.
Enclosure looks good. I would add a shallow water dish, though. Clay plant saucers work great.
 
Well, I was going off Tyler Stewart's site, he prefers not to offer a water dish daily and only soaks his babies weekly.
 
I am familiar with Tyler from another forum. He has a lot of great experience. If you're not going to offer a water dish then make sure to check your tortoise's weight frequently. If he starts to feel a little "hollow," I'd change approaches and provide the water dish. If he always feels pretty solid, the soaking routine is working just fine.
 
Thanks for the tip!

I've kept terrestrial chelonians before, and the constant defecation on water bowls is a pain. I figured it makes enough sense that these high-heat tolerating, grassland tortoises get a lot of moisture from their diet and only occasionally soak in nature anyway.
 
Baby sulcatas spend the majority of their time in burrows in the wild. There is a significant amount of moisture in these burrows and recent research indicates that moisture helps prevent pyramiding.
My little guy had the perfect diet and I soaked him every 5 days or so in the beginning. He still started pyramiding and I decided to change the substrate and keep a water dish in his enclosure full-time. After 6 months he has leveled out and stopped pyramiding. I understand the concern about changing the water, but my guy rarely (once a week maybe) defecates in his dish. Even when he does, it is not a messy or a loose consistency and it doesn't smell at all. He loves timothy hay though and I think that has a lot to do with it.
 
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