Travancore Tortoise

The Travancore tortoise is a large forest tortoise, growing up to 33 cm in length. It can be identified by the absence of a scute right behind the head, and by the second scute along the vertebral column being the highest point of the shell. It is restricted to the Western Ghats, in the Indian states of Kerala, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu (Wikipedia, general species account).

It lives in hill forest at 450–850 m and feeds mainly on grasses and herbs, also taking molluscs, insects, carrion, fungi and fruits. Males ram each other with their shells during the breeding season, between November and March. The female makes a shallow nest in the ground and lays one to five eggs, and hatchlings are 55–60 mm long. The species is hunted and is affected by forest fires, habitat destruction and fragmentation.