ANIMAL: African Spurred Tortoise/Sulcata Tortoise Geochelone sulcata Type of Animal: Tortoise Habitat: Desert, desert-savanna transition zone, savanna-forest transition zone, thorn shrubland, savanna, grassland, semi-desert. Only found in arid & semi-arid regions. Location(s): Southern edge of Sahara, Sahel region of Africa Appearance: Males much larger than females, brown to golden yellow color, growth rings on scutes in carapace, spurs on rear legs, deep concave round shell in male, flatter shell in females, deeply forked gulars in male. Food/Diet: Grasses, clovers, weeds, greens, leaves Status in Wild: Endangered Conservation: Breeding from zoos & private breeders Lifestyle: Solitary or small herds of 1 male w/ 2-4 females. Additional Info: Called: Male Female Young-Hatchling Group-Herd Weight: Male-100-200 lbs Female-80-100 lbs Young-0.96 oz Gestation: 2 months Height: 2.5 ft Body Length: Male-3 ft Female-1.6-2 ft Life Span: 50-80 years Tail Length: Male-Long/thick Female-Short/blunt Main predators are canids & felids. Males very aggressive towards each other & sometimes fight to death w/ other males by flipping rival over. If male can’t get back up, it could overheat. Males also bite & ram at each other. During courtship, male rams & bites female, then immobilizes her while mating. Very common in pet trade. Largest mainland tortoise species in the world. Females lay 40-120 eggs during breeding season from September-November. Males vocal during breeding season. Doesn’t hibernate in cool weather but slows down. Exceptional diggers, able to dig burrows up to 20 ft deep. Burrows made to keep cool. Very strong animals able to ram through weak fences. Most active at dawn & dusk (crepuscular). Burrows can be 2.5-3 ft deep, sometimes creating tunnels extending more than 10 ft. Latin name comes from Latin word sulcus meaning furrow referring to furrows on shells. Fun Fact(s): Can go weeks w/o food or water & can drink up to 15% of body weight. Some cultures keep tortoise in village because tortoise seen as mediator between men & gods. Not recommended as pet for many, due to potentially large size & temptation as chew toy if person owns house cat or dog. Generally peaceful & non-aggressive in temperament. Symbol of virtue, happiness, fertility, & longevity in Senegal. They love dry, outdoor weather from 70-95 F.
Howdy! Would you mind if I share your blog with my myspace group?
There’s a lot of folks that I think would really appreciate your content.
Please let me know. Thanks
Hello there! Do you use Twitter? I’d like to follow you if that would be okay.
I’m definitely enjoying your blog and look forward to new updates.
It’s going to be finish of mine day, but before end I am reading this impressive article to improve my knowledge.
Thanks for sharing your info. I truly appreciate your efforts and I am waiting for your next post thanks once again.
I visited multiple sites but the audio quality for audio songs existing at this site is truly wonderful.
Someone necessarily assist to make significantly posts I
might state. This is the first time I frequented your website page
and to this point? I amazed with the research you made to make this actual publish extraordinary.
Excellent task!
Nice post. I was checking continuously this blog and
I am inspired! Extremely useful information specifically the closing phase :
) I handle such information much. I used to be looking for this certain info for a very lengthy time.
Thanks and best of luck.
I know this website presents quality depending content and additional information, is there any other web page which
presents these kinds of data in quality?
If you desire to improve your knowledge simply keep visiting
this site and be updated with the most recent news update posted here.
Hi my loved one! I want to say that this article is awesome, great written and include approximately all significant infos.
I’d like to look extra posts like this .
Hi there, I read your new stuff regularly. Your humoristic style
is awesome, keep it up!
Great article, just what I wanted to find.
It’s a shame you don’t have a donate button! I’d most certainly donate to this brilliant blog!
I suppose for now i’ll settle for book-marking and adding your RSS feed
to my Google account. I look forward to fresh updates and will talk about this blog with my
Facebook group. Talk soon!
This is the perfect web site for everyone
who wants to find out about this topic. You realize so much its almost hard to argue with you (not
that I actually will need to…HaHa). You certainly put a brand new spin on a topic which has been discussed for many years.
Great stuff, just excellent!
I used to be able to find good advice from your blog posts.
Spot on with this write-up, I absolutely feel this website needs a great deal more attention. I’ll probably be back again to read more, thanks for
the information!
Howdy! This blog post couldn’t be written any better!
Going through this post reminds me of my previous roommate!
He constantly kept talking about this. I am going to send this article to him.
Fairly certain he’s going to have a great read. Thank you
for sharing!
Hi, this weekend is nice designed for me, because this point in time i am reading this great informative piece of writing here at my
home.