Can you mix tortoise species?

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Stingray12

Gambusia
MFK Member
Aug 27, 2007
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Saranac Lake, NY
Its defently a no go for the snake. Thats ok, I'll get one when I get out of college. This has been interesting me for a while:

What if I got a big kiddie pool or something similar and mixed a few similarly sized tortoises in there.

Is it even possible? I know with turtles it depends on the species.

If so, what ones would be good to mix? I would be getting small ones and would upgrade enclosure if I had to.
 
I think it might be OK but you might have problems if you have multiple males, and them fighting over the female(s).

And of course make sure their requirements are similar, for example I wouldn't try mixing say redfoots and russians.
 
You should have no problems mixing different species of tortoises together, just make sure the ones you have either all have respiratory disease or they don't because they will give it to each other. My only concern it the growth rate of the tortoises because they could all start out small but in a few years you can have some giants in there with the amount of african spur thigh (sulcata) around these days.
 
I've heard leopards and sulcatas get along alright.
Well, until the sulcata outgrows it anyway.
 
I've had a sulcata in with my russians for a year. The only problem I get is they are not careful and don't mind bowling one another over. Other than that, one big happy family.
 
you should get them outta that setup and in a few months the sulcata should be too big to be housed with the russian let alone having the proper care
 
ugh... why would you want to mix species of different orgins together? Maybe its ok in fish, but I wouldnt recommend it in reptiles. IN MY OPINION (and thats just me), I keep species in they're own groups, sulcattas with suclattas, redfoots with redfoots, stars with stars, etc... (I do this aswell with Freshwater turtles) I dont dont even mix species from the same regions like sulcattas and leopards, or redfoots w/ yellowfoots. Why risk they're health. Male sulcattas are very aggressive towards any male tortoises in they're enclosures. Are both animals WC? CBB? If you dont have the space to keep two animals in they're own enclosures, maybe your better of to just have one tort vs. two.
 
What kind of toises are we talking about here anyway? Mixing animals of diferent habitats and specialy diferent continents is a big no no, even mixing cb with wild cauths of the same species can be hazardous. A toise mix that Ive seen and works is cb yellow and red foots, of corse you run into the risk of hibridizing. On the other hand males of certain species like hermanns are to agressive to put with anything else.
 
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