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I am afraid I can´t see what you mean. In a mammal I would think of a renal failure. The kidney does not concentrate urine and the body looses water. It tries to compensate by oral intake. Depending on the magnitude of the renal failure it would compensate or not…
As a tortoises´s kidney cannot concentrate like a mammal´s and the bladder reabsorpts water it might work different.
And this would be related to water balance, so, I can´t see where you are pointing



Then, it really happens that some animals, for whatever reason, grow smooth (not meant healthy) in spite of a high protein diet and a fast growth?
I don´t understand why, even very well hydrated animals, wouldn´t show pyramiding with a excessively high protein diet (increased calcium demand, diminished calcium absorption , increased keratin growth…) The good hydration would help to prevent the kidney and liver damage, but what about all the rest?.

Andy, I am just expressing my confusion, I don´t pretend to pull your tongue about something you are still working in. I will wait for your article.
Jordi

I am afraid I can´t see what you mean. In a mammal I would think of a renal failure. The kidney does not concentrate urine and the body looses water. It tries to compensate by oral intake. Depending on the magnitude of the renal failure it would compensate or not…
As a tortoises´s kidney cannot concentrate like a mammal´s and the bladder reabsorpts water it might work different.
And this would be related to water balance, so, I can´t see where you are pointing

Absolutely correct Jordi. However, there is no water balance problem in these animals. The claims that tortoises that demonstrate so-called "pyramiding" are also dehydrated is entirely false. What I was pointing out was the false assumption by those who suggest humidity is the cause that dehydration (of some unknown type) is involved.


Then, it really happens that some animals, for whatever reason, grow smooth (not meant healthy) in spite of a high protein diet and a fast growth? I don´t understand why, even very well hydrated animals, wouldn´t show pyramiding with a excessively high protein diet (increased calcium demand, diminished calcium absorption , increased keratin growth…) The good hydration would help to prevent the kidney and liver damage, but what about all the rest?.

Again, you are correct. You ask "what about all the rest"? Exactly. What you need to look at here is the bone density. It is also the case ( that it is not whole body dehydration or hydration status that affects this...

It is unfortunate in many ways that so much attention is given to "pyramiding" as a PRIMARY PROBLEM, when in fact, it is simply one symptom of a much greater underlying pathology - which can be suppressed without affecting the real problem.... which is still there in such cases.

Andy

OK, but could it not be that a humid hide accidentally, as it were, provides tortoises with something like a hide or scrape, and a 100% humid hide would certainly achieve 1).
Could the addtition of a humid hide to what might otherwise be a rather sterile breeding set-up also accidentally achieve point 2) ? In other words, could the proponents of humid-hides be misconstruing the "success" of the latter as being due directly to the humidity (which doesn't seem to make sense physiologically), whereas in fact it is the resultant tortoise behaviour which is having the beneficial effect as you have outlinedas being the importance of micro-climates generally?

Don't get me wrong - I'm not arguing for humid-hides as such, although it's obvious that as a possible micro-climate for some species (redfoots, kinixys, stars etc) they'd be the right thing to offer. My son's two baby stars do seem to appreciate the extra humidity of such a provision, seeming to select that part of their table as and when. And they're growing smoothly. But he's very careful with their diet as well, so wouldn't be ready to attribute success to the humidity. Presumably a very humid hide wouldn't be the micro-climate of choice of other species, especially meds. (But would they be better than nothing, if they improved the habitat of a nursery enclosure and contributed to the avoidance of chronic dehydration, albeit being too humid, and also helped to promote the beneficial behaviour, especially feeding behaviour which you describe? - although feeding high-protein would presumably negate that?)

No, I'm only trying to see how the humid-hide advocates might, albeit unwittingly, be onto something, but have misinterpreted the humidity as the main factor, and maybe just got lucky (or think they have) on the dietary front?

Stuart

Hi Stuart
I think Andy explained in another post how difficult it would be to create a 100% HR. I don´t think you could find it in Mediterranean tortoises habitat unless you took measures while or just after raining!
Anyway, I don´t think humidity by itself in an arid environment species is the worst problem (although it is a problem). The worst would be if humidity really helped in preventing pyramiding. I see pyramiding as an indicator that something is going wrong. It is a symptom of an illness. If you could make the symptom dissapear with a drug would it mean that there is no illness? I would like to be sure before using it.
I had horsfieldii hatchlings. I kept them outside in a mediterranean country. They could bury as much as they could. I fed them only wild weeds. And they started with a slight pyramiding. I posted about it and I realized I was feeding too much food, so , they were having too much protein. Without the pyramiding I wouldn´t have changed anything and maybe some years later they would have bladder stones, a renal failure, hepatic disease…I don´t want to mask pyramiding with humidity or whatever else. I want that it does not appear because my feeding schedule is correct.
Someone could argue that it is not only the pyramiding that it prevents. That it is also prevents the MBD, the renal and hepatic functions… well, it has not been demonstrated yet. And regarding hepatic and renal systems, it should be a long term study that showed that the high protein levels in high humidity conditions didn´t have any undesireble effects.
In the study they agree that high protein levels correlate with fast growth, but they do not agree that it correlates with pyramiding. How would they explain those wild graecas in Morocco with pyramiding that, curiously, fed from a bean field? (Andy posted it somewhere). Maybe the watering system didn´t work properly?

Jordi

Tortoise kept in a garden in Spain, within the natural range.

Diet? Fed on large amounts of lettuce.

Tortoises in the same street, in another garden, fed only on the plants growing there are fine. I'll try to get some photos of those too.

Andy

If I were a high humidity keeper I could argue that :

The tortoise let on its own in the garden with natural graze, doesn’t feed when the vegetation is dry and enters an aestivation, so, it avoids feeding while prone to dehydration due to weather conditions, thing that doesn´t happen with the other one that has food available through all the summer.

You know what I think, but this is something that could be said.
I wonder:
Do they both or none aestivate?
Do they both have access to drinking water?

Jordi

Jordi,

Both estivated. Both hibernated. Both had equal access to drinking water.

Andy

Yes Andy, but in other instances, with identical parameters, and being the humidity the only one changing many people get different results. I am just talking about external shape of the carapace. Same for calcium intake, or good lighting, temperature, fibre content of the diet...

You very well know I am not an advocate of Testudos sleeping under sphagnum, and God knows I am getting good results in my hatchlings WITHOUT wet hides at all, but I want to know why.

Regards!!!!

Well, that is the basis of the paper I have been working on for the past couple of years....

Andy

I knew that would be your answer. I am literally laughing out loudly at work.

Surrender: I have to wait till the paper is published. Don't give anything in advance next time we met in Almería because I will tape it

Regards!!!!