If your interest in reptiles comes from the pet hobby, you probably know these guys as sulcata tortoises- but if your interest comes from the zoo world, you're more likely to know them as African spurred tortoises, or African spur thighed tortoises. Bud here is showing off why! See those spurs on his legs? It's theorized that those are to help defend against predators. When a tortoise like this tucks into its shell, the spurs stick out and present an uncomfortable area to bite.
What's interesting to me is that the spurs that they're named after are actually the ones on their hind legs, even though they're much smaller than the big spikes on their front legs, which you can see quite clearly on Bub below:
(Yes, their names are Bub and Bud. They're rescued taken in by a man named Bob, and they came with those names, believe it or not!)
Oh yeah, a sulcata is a one-tortoise wrecking crew. They're a hundred plus pounds of determination and strength, coupled with digging claws that just won't quit. They're the lovechild of a footstool and a bulldozer, powered by grass and without any understanding whatsoever of these things called "walls" and "boundaries."
And there's an important reason for this! Sulcatas are landscape architects on a grand scale. In their native habitat, they dig enormous burrows that are used by lots of species- it's not uncommon to see small mammals and even some big ones use them for shelter. Gopher tortoises' and desert tortoises' burrows are used similarly here in the US, but the difference is size. Sulcatas are the largest mainland tortoises- Galapagos and Aldabra tortoises, which are island tortoises, do get bigger- and they don't understand what drywall and wooden fences are for. They know how to dig and eat and dig some more. And then do some more digging.
