Henry hibernates

Just for the record, Henry the tortoise hibernated on September 16th and is now safely installed in his winter home. This is a customised rabbit hutch which is now in a cool, dark place in our frost-free garage. He has always been slightly out of sync with the seasons, and even more so during the past couple of years. It will be easy to see when he wakes up and starts moving again and although this could happen in 10-12 weeks I do not expect to see anything until early January 2010.  Then the whole annual cycle should start again.

Doesn’t time fly…

My posts here have been few during recent months but I have been busy. At least, that’s my story. When not sharing the domestic chores with Granny Anne I might be trying to paint a masterpiece (not much risk of succeeding but it’s fun trying). Or I might be messing about with music, or engaged in some domestic project or other, or doing a bit of gardening or just reading a book. You might even, on a warm sunny day, find me doing absolutely nothing – for a brief period only mind you – but sitting outdoors (in the shade of course) daydreaming while contemplating a large glass of cold Guinness. It is all part of the hard-earned pleasure of being retired and with, thankfully, few demands on my time but plenty of hobbies and interests to keep me occupied.
Besides, Granny Anne is doing enough posting for both of us and it’s all good topical stuff, not forgetting our daughter, Jennie, who is celebrating 70,000 visitors to her blog by running a giveaway competition until the end of the month. To enter, all you have to do is comment on one or more posts in her blog.

I spotted this little fellow in the garden the other day so dutifully dashed indoors for the camera. I think it is the caterpillar of a Grey Dagger Moth. It was one of the few really warm, sunny days that we have enjoyed recently and even Henry (our tortoise) wandered about for a few hours. This behaviour by Henry shouldn’t be remarkable at this time of year but he has started to behave strangely lately. Throughout most of the quarter century or so that he has been with us, Henry has been in the habit of hibernating from some time in early October until  mid-February. Last year he hibernated early. I imagined that this was due to the dull, wet summer and the resulting poor temperature and daylight levels, that combined to convince Henry that it was autumn already.  Though I didn’t quite realise it at the time, by August he was preparing to hibernate already – several weeks earlier than a few years ago. It looks as if he is doing the same this year, coming out from under his bush only on the warmest and brightest days and not going far or eating much even then. I don’t think there is any cause for alarm. Tortoises are not supposed to eat for some weeks before hibernating so that their digestive system is empty while they “sleep”. On the other hand I have to remember that he is likely to be waking again at the beginning of January and will then have to be pampered indoors for a few months!

I have started three paintings recentlyand they are looking promising so far.  I like to take time with the oil paintings, building them up in several stages with adequate drying time between stages.  Having started to paint it is better that I do an hour or two every two or three days. This is easy to arrange with three “on the go” together. 
Music has been a big preoccupation recently as I have had a lot of catching up to do in order to keep my side of the deal to help our young friend, Maria,  to start learning the violin. Maria, in turn, is helping me to tackle the clarinet.  It is nearly 60 years since I started to play the violin and around 50 since I stopped playing regularly. So I have started practising and I must say that, at first, I was not that far ahead of my “pupil”! It is all coming back to me though and now, just to be awkward, I want to play the violin again as well as the clarinet – but not at the same time of course.
Meanwhile, Maria is showing signs of becoming a “Star” pupil. I don’t think Anne-Sophie Mutter needs to start worrying  just yet but…
As for me, well, I can read the music fairly well and translate it quickly to fingering on the violin but the big challenge is to do the same on the clarinet.
We both have suitable learner’s books for our respective instruments and they are almost as tedious as they always were in my young days though the technology has since come to the rescue to some extent with CDs containing demonstrations and backing tracks. I have been scanning the internet for sheet music to vary the diet a bit. I have also found a lot of midi files in the public domain – or at least they are free for non-commercial use – together with software which (as I understand it) will produce sheet music from the midi files and allow both to be edited to make new arrangements. The same software allows composing from scratch. It is all on trial at present while I decide which particular package to buy, depending on how many of the functions I really need. Information about the Notation software that I am trying can be found here.

Henry goes outside

Henry smiles for the camera!

Having been awake since early January, and waiting for suitable weather, Henry is outside full-time now. On most days recently he has been out for a few hours when there has been any sunshine. Otherwise he has been housed and fed indoors as described in previous posts. I have noticed this year that he has been nowhere near as lively indoors as in previous years, though he has been eating quite well, which I see as a good sign. On the other hand, when in the garden, even on cool days, he seems more contented, wandering about and munching the occasional weed.

Henry's choice of nightly accommodation is under the Skimmia bush (right of centre), where it is relatively sheltered from wind and rain and he is insulated within a pile of hay.

 

A couple of evenings ago a mild night was forecast and I decided that he could stay out all night. I had intended to provide a generous quantity of hay under his favourite bush, where he has spent the night in previous years, and then make sure that he found it. The trouble was, I couldn’t find him. He must have tucked himself away in a secluded corner somewhere so I left him. Sure enough, yesterday morning he was out in the sun again. So yesterday afternoon as the shadows got longer and the sun started to leave our  garden I showed him the pile of hay under his bush and a few minutes later he had buried himself in it almost completely out of sight.
It seems likely that Henry will stay out now so long as night temperatures continue to improve. All I have to do is keep an eye on the weather forecast.

Henry’s Easter stroll

 It is nearly three weeks since my previous post about Henry and he is in the house still, because it has been quite cool at night. Today could hardly have been a nicer Easter Sunday with brilliant sunshine and almost completely calm. So, after lunch, our enclosed rear garden was warm enough for Henry to be put out on the grass for an hour or two.

His first move was to head directly on to the border from which I had removed the box hedge only days ago so that  the Head Gardener could plant fruit bushes instead. He seemed a bit confused by the absence of the hedge, under which he used to walk from one side of the garden to the other while keeping out of sight.

After a while he settled in a typical sunbathng position while he thought about it and about the potential of  all the new fruit bushes. This was followed by a further exploration of the borders.

Next came a quick inspection of the lawn during which he nibbled one dandelion leaf and that was all. This seemed to confirm that he is getting enough to eat indoors. He even ignored the dandelion flowers, having had his daily quota of those indoors at lunchtime.
On days like this Henry can be outside all day but I will be watching night temperatures for some time yet to ensure that it is not just frost-free, which is essential,  but actually relatively mild when he stays out all night.

Henry waits patiently

Having emerged from his annual hibernation in January, Henry the tortoise has remained in his customised rabbit hutch indoors ever since. For the past few weeks he has been on a low table just inside the glass door at the rear of our living room, where he gets plenty of daylight, and even sunshine, without too wide a variation in temperature.  It is the only place in the house that is suitable, except, perhaps, on the windowsill in our bedroom. I think Mrs JW might have something to say about that.
The Meteorological Office anticipates that temperatures during the next couple of months will be at or below the seasonal average, so there seems little prospect of putting Henry out in the garden for some weeks yet. However, that is a three-stage process and the first stage should happen fairly soon.
The rear six feet of our garage, which faces more or less South, has been partitioned off from the rest and the rear wall replaced by glass, incorporating a patio door.  All this was done long before we bought this house. It has reduced the garage to a small workshop and storage space, hardly big enough, even if empty, for anything but the smallest town car. However, it is a useful arrangement from Henry’s point of view, and you can’t do enough for a good tortoise.
The first stage of acclimatising Henry to the great outdoors is to move him out there, where he will get adequate warmth and plenty of light by day, while not getting too cold overnight. On calm, sunny days he can start stage two by spending an hour or two in the garden, gradually extending the time until he is outside full-time.
Meanwhile, Henry is active daily though happy still to spend much of his time just sitting in the sunlight that has been more plentiful recently. His diet includes lettuce, thinly sliced apple, grapes and one of his favourite treats, dandelions. The latter have started to appear in our front garden, so I have told him that he can look forward to frequent treats for a while. He didn’t seem particularly impressed.

Henry is eating

Just a quick post this time to record the fact that Henry the tortoise started eating on January 19th, just six days after awaking from his hibernation. A delay of five to six days is normal for Henry and if I think that he is delaying too long I have only to pick up the food and hold it for him to get him started. I don’t know why this is so but I strongly suspect that what he really wants is a bite out of my finger. He tried once and he is not getting a second chance!

More Henry!

Henry, the morning after he came out of hibernation, taking an unusual interest in lettuce though he is unlikely to eat for 4-5 days.

Henry is our Tortoise, of indeterminate age, given to us by a neighbour around 24 years ago. Two evenings ago he woke up from his annual hibernation. As I type this he is exploring his indoor accommodation in between taking rests. He has food available, though he is unlikely to be interested in it for a few more days, and he has had two lukewarm baths already, one yesterday and one today. These give him an opportunity to drink (which he did today). This is very important directly after waking from hibernation as it helps to flush out unwanted chemicals that have accumulated during hibernation and it also helps to prepare his digestive system for more food. Straight after waking from hibernation a tortoise may have only a few days reserves of energy left and should be feeding again within a week. The baths also helped to warm him, though they were little more than room temperature, and judging by the contented way he relaxes when placed in the water I am sure that he enjoys a good soak!

Henry enjoyng relaxing in his bath - and having a drink!

The hibernation is a strange phenomenon but looking after Henry has never been a problem for us. The tortoise is supposed to stop eating around six weeks prior to hibernation so that his digestive system is emptied in time. I am sure no-one told Henry. On the other hand he does stop eating some time before hibernating, then spends less time wandering around the garden and more time sleeping. All we have to do is pop him into his hibernating quarters during this slowing down phase, and if he is not obviously wanting to go out again the next day, then he has taken the hint. Obviously we keep an eye on him just in case the weather suddenly gets a lot warmer and he decides to be active again.

And after the bath? Well, the 2009 portrait of course!

Usually I start to keep an eye on him from the beginning of February so as to catch any sign of movement. I started much earlier this year (at Christmas last year actually) because he had hibernated so much earlier than usual in 2008 – not surprisingly given the cold, wet August.

Henry the Tortoise, 2009 Part 1.

It was nearly the end of August 2008 the last time I posted about Henry. At the time he was looking a bit sluggish and ready to hibernate any day, which would have been around 3-4 weeks earlier than usual. He perked up a bit after warming himself for a short spell in “his house” (a customised rabbit hutch) but hibernated a week later anyway. He spent the winter in his house inside our garage, where there is no risk of frost in normal conditions. When outdoor temperatures threatened to drop well below freezing a week or two ago I thought that it just might get down to freezing inside our garage. So I brought him into our house where he took up residence on the worktop in my hobbies room (that is, the spare bedroom where I play with my paints, musical instruments, computers etc.). This room is cool but quite warm enough for me and I reckoned that if the higher temperature (compared with the garage) caused Henry to wake up, then it would be no bad thing as he was due to do that anyway.

On January 13th this year, about a month earlier than usual, but still after around 17-18 weeks of hibernation Henry appeared from under his pile of hay at around 8.45pm. At the time I was trying to work out how to set out my painting equipment, now that Henry had taken charge of my worktop, when I glanced at his house and there he was peering out at me.  

As soon as Henry wakes up each year food is made available though he is unlikely to eat for at least 4-5 days. The day after he wakes up he is given a bath in a shallow plastic tray of lukewarm water, then dried carefully. This is a good time to inspect him closely to make sure that mouth and eyes appear normal and that there are no problems developing elsewhere. He will remain indoors until it is warm enough in the garden for him to go out for an hour or two during the day. Eventually, probably some time in May, he will remain out day and night.

I forgot to ask him whether it was the warmth, the light, or the cool strains of the Dutch Swing College Jazz Band playing quietly in the background, that had awoken him. Knowing Henry, it was probably the latter.

Henry is confused

Normally, at this time of the year, Henry, our tortoise, gets out of his bed at about 8am and wanders about the garden, exploring, eating and sunbathing, before retiring for the night between five and six in the evening.

Henry’s bed is a couple of handfuls of hay under a bush in our back garden. For a few days recently I noticed that he was not to be seen until late morning and even then he plodded no further than a couple of feet from his bed before stopping and remaining stationary for the rest of the day. I know how he felt. It had been quite cool at night and cloudy during the day, when not actually raining. Poor old Henry wasn’t getting the sunshine he needed to warm him sufficiently, and to provide sufficient hours of good daylight, to become fully active.

This would not be a cause for concern for just a day or two but we have had the dullest, wettest August that I have ever known. Henry obviously thinks that summer has long gone and has therefore displayed the sort of behaviour that would not be at all unusual in October, during the week or two prior to hiberrnation. However, to hibernate too early could cause problems, especially if we then experienced several days of really warm weather in September, when he might think it was time to wake up again. Henry has usually hibernated for about 12 weeks, waking up in the second half of February, when I keep him in his converted rabbit hutch indoors. There he gets fed and exposed to plenty of daylight and warmth until it really is warm enough for him to start going outside, for just an hour or two at first. By some time in May it is usually safe for him to stay out 24/7 but we still watch the weather forecast for any risk of frost.

If Henry hibernated at the end of August it would be necessary to limit the hibernation period by waking him at Christmas, when he would have a full four months, at least, to put up with being stuck indoors. So, as a temporary measure, I have now reinstated the “half-board” arrangement whereby he comes indoors at around 5pm and out again in the morning if it is warm and, preferably, sunny. This seems to have done the trick. Henry was much more active today even though actual sunshine was limited to a couple of short periods. I am hoping (aren’t we all) for some sustained sunny weather before Autumn sets in properly. This will enable Henry to remain active and feed adequately before winding down for hibernation naturally at the proper time.

Henry the Tortoise

Henry has been outside, day and night, for about a week now  (May 7th) and is enjoying the run of the entire garden for the first time in around twenty years. We arrived here in the winter when Henry was in hibernation still and since then the whole garden has been “tortoise-proofed” so that he cannot get trapped in small spaces and it is surrounded by walls so he has no chance of escape, especially as he doesn’t have a motorbike.

The space to which he has access includes a  small lawn with surrounding borders containing trees and shrubs, and an equal area of paving on various levels. It is amazing how many nooks and crannies are created by trees and shrubs and other features and when Henry couldn’t be found a few nights ago we were almost inclined to believe that he had discovered a way out, though we knew it was impossible. Sunshine the next day brought him out on to the lawn again, totally oblivious to our overnight anxiety – in fact I am sure that he was gazing around as we approached, whistling softly and with a “What me?” expression on his face.

 

We have discovered already that he has a talent for climbing and a fine sense of balance. Though the heights involved are not great, they are impressive in relation to Henry’s size but he seems less able to work out how to climb down again. So I have modified some features of the garden to allow him to climb safely while also providing an easy descent. 

 

There are quite a lot of myths and misunderstandings about tortoises. Information is available on the web and the following links would be good places to start: 

http://www.tortoisetrust.org/care/faq.html#numbers

http://www.britishcheloniagroup.org.uk/

We are enjoying a particularly warm spell of weather at the moment with mild nights. However, this could change quite abruptly so the weather forecasts are being watched for any indications of sudden cooling, especially at night. Henry’s indoor accomodation remains on standby just in case there is any risk of frost over the next few weeks (unlikely as it may seem).