# Tortoise owners, where is the poop coming from!

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tortoise-owners-where-is-the-poop-coming-from/217895>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [December 9, 2003, 12:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tortoise-owners-where-is-the-poop-coming-from/217895 "2003-12-09T12:21:56Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![SeekingTruth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/34f0e0/32.png) [@SeekingTruth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SeekingTruth)\
**Post date:** [December 9, 2003, 12:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tortoise-owners-where-is-the-poop-coming-from/217895/1 "2003-12-09T12:21:56Z")

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I own a Russian tortoise. I bought him about 3 weeks ago after owning a snapping turtle for years (he died). I feed it a gel for tortoises, supplemented with Romaine and Raddichio lettuce, with sparing apple slices and always a calcium dusting. Got the UVA/UVB light, heat lamp and under tank heater, fresh water, etc.

Every couple days, I clean out the clumps formed in the Calci-Sand.

I put him in a bucket of luke-warm water and he would not stop shitting! Is this normal? Is it supposed to be done more often? How the hell can he hold it 3 weeks?!?

Was the bucket of water a pranks foisted on me from friends who want a good laugh? Are they supposed to “hold” the stuff for complete digestion? Is 3 weeks too long to wait? And is the bucket of water a stimulus? Or would it happen anyway?

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**Author:** ![gluteus\_maximus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/f17d59/32.png) [@gluteus\_maximus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gluteus_maximus)\
**Post date:** [December 9, 2003, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tortoise-owners-where-is-the-poop-coming-from/217895/2 "2003-12-09T16:22:16Z")

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While IANAH, maybe, since tortoises are generally dry-land animals, as opposed to turtles, which live in or near water… your tortoise may have been _scared_, you know, in the proverbial way, when you dunked him.

Maybe [this](http://www.russiantortoise.net/) will be useful.

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**Author:** ![altor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/96bed5/32.png) [@altor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/altor)\
**Post date:** [December 9, 2003, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tortoise-owners-where-is-the-poop-coming-from/217895/3 "2003-12-09T18:47:22Z")

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I do not own a tortoise, but I found this quote [here](http://www.sdturtle.org/RUSSIAN%20(Testudo%20Horsfieldii)%20CARE%20SHEET.htm):

> [@](#):
>
> These tortoises cannot swim and can drown in water that goes over their head.