Tortoise Sex

*smirks*

I'll bet no one has blogged on this topic yet!



These are my two Russian Tortoises, Boris and Natasha, sitting with a 12" ruler.


Boris is kind of lazy and not a really good eater. He spends most of his time sitting in a corner looking pissed. His favorite food is green peas. As in many reptile species, the male is the smaller of the two. (Natasha should eventually reach 10", with Boris reaching maybe 8".)

Natasha is way more fun. She runs around; she looks at you when you talk to her. She has probed every single spot she can reach of her cage sidewalls and floor looking for weaknesses she can exploit to escape. Her favorite food is the stemmy part of romaine lettuce. Tasha is all about the crunch.

The way you sex tortoises and turtles is: Males have a slightly concave bottom shell. Females are either flat or slightly convex. The male has to be concave in order to mount the female.

So what happens is, when Boris has saved up enough energy to feel horny he chases Tasha down and bites at her back feet hissing until she assumes what I guess is a good sex position. Then he heaves himself up onto her like a little shelled stallion and moans & groans something fierce for about 5 - 10 seconds. Who knew tortoises could moan so loudly? Then Tasha bucks him off. I have no idea if he is moaning in tortoise ecstacy or tortoise frustration because she bucks him off too soon. They'll mate 5 or 6 times within a few minutes - then ignore each other again. I have never seen his little tortoise package, but he must have one - right?

Anyway. That's it from the Swami Nature Preserve for Tuesday, July 22nd.