Safe Foods for Tortoises: The UK Food and Plant Directory

Our records cover 105 foods, each rated separately for Mediterranean, grazing and tropical forest species. This page is the way into them.

Before you browse, one pattern in the data is worth seeing, because it answers the underlying question faster than any list.

What the ratings actually show

Here is how the 105 foods break down by category, using the verdicts for Mediterranean species since that is what most British keepers own.

Weeds and flowers are the only categories that produce a meaningful number of everyday foods. Not one of the 22 vegetables or 18 fruits earns a regular rating for a Mediterranean tortoise, and every processed or animal-derived item is an outright no.

That is the whole diet in one table. If your tortoise eats mostly from the top two rows, you are doing well. If it eats mostly from the vegetable and fruit rows, the diet needs rebuilding regardless of how carefully you chose the individual items.

Browse by food type

Weeds are the foundation for every species we cover. Thirteen records, twelve of which grow wild in Britain. Plantain, sow thistle, mallow, hawkbit, bristly oxtongue and nipplewort are the everyday ones. Dandelion, clover, chickweed, nettle and bramble sit a band below. See best weeds for tortoises.

Flowers are genuinely good food rather than a garnish. Nine records: hibiscus, viola and pansy, violet, calendula and campanula for regular use, rose, cornflower and nasturtium in rotation. See safe flowers for tortoises.

Leafy greens are what most keepers actually buy, and the ratings are sobering. Sixteen records, of which exactly one earns regular use: corn salad, sold as lamb’s lettuce. Kale, spring greens, watercress, rocket, chicory and the lettuces all sit at moderation. See what vegetables can tortoises eat.

Vegetables are the weakest category on the site. Twenty-two records, twelve of them avoid. Root vegetables, brassicas like cabbage and broccoli, peas and beans, potato and sweetcorn all fall short for different reasons.

Fruit is eighteen records, none rated regular for Mediterranean or grazing species, though the picture changes for forest tortoises. See can tortoises eat fruit.

Grasses and hay are five records that flip entirely by species. Moderation for a Testudo, regular for a Sulcata or leopard tortoise, where they should form most of the diet. See grass and hay for tortoises.

Herbs, shrubs, succulents and fungi make up the remainder. Mint and thyme are regular, most other herbs sit at moderation, and parsley is best avoided for its oxalate content. Prickly pear pads are regular for grazing species. Mushrooms are the one genuinely species-dependent record on the site.

Browse by safety status

Every record carries one of six verdicts.

Suitable regularly. Fourteen foods for Mediterranean species, every one of which grows in Britain.

Feed in moderation. The largest band, and the one people misread most often. These are foods that are fine a few times a week and a problem daily.

Feed sparingly. Mostly fruit and soft, starchy vegetables. Small amounts, occasionally.

Do not feed. Twenty-eight foods carry this rating for every species group. Animal protein, pulses, high-oxalate plants, the heavier brassicas and outright toxic garden plants.

Species dependent. Currently one record, mushrooms.

Insufficient evidence. Reserved for foods where reliable guidance does not exist. We would rather say so than guess.

The complete banded list is in the tortoise food chart, which prints to A4. The complete avoid list with reasoning is at tortoise foods to avoid.

Browse by species group

Twenty-five of the 105 foods carry a different verdict depending on which tortoise you have, and they move in two predictable directions.

Grasses and succulents move up for grazing species. Grass, timothy, couch grass, barley grass, wheat grass and prickly pear pads are all everyday foods for a Sulcata or leopard tortoise.

Fruit and soft vegetables move up for forest species. Every fruit in the sparingly band, plus courgette, marrow, pumpkin, squash and bell pepper, moves to moderation for a red-footed tortoise.

Nothing ever moves the other way. A food rated do not feed is rated that way for all of them. Which group your tortoise belongs to is explained in tortoise diets by species.

Growing your own

Thirty-nine of the 105 records will grow in a British garden, and they are concentrated exactly where you would want them: twelve of the thirteen weeds, eight of the nine flowers, seven of the eight herbs, all five grasses, all three shrubs and both succulents.

Only two of the sixteen leafy greens are UK-growable, and none of the fruit or vegetables. In other words, almost everything worth feeding regularly can be grown, and almost everything you would buy in a supermarket cannot. See grow your own tortoise food.

Popular food questions

The queries that come up most, with short answers.

Carrots: sparingly. Root vegetable, high in readily digestible carbohydrate, poor calcium to phosphorus ratio. More.

Kale: moderation. Good mineral profile, but a goitrogenic brassica. More.

Spring greens: moderation, for the same reasons as kale. More.

Dandelions: moderation rather than the staple most sites claim, because of oxalates and its diuretic effect. More.

Peas, meat and dog food: no, for any species. Protein overload causes shell deformity and renal damage.

Grass: depends entirely on your species, as above.

How safety ratings are sourced

Records are written from specialist and veterinary sources, not compiled from other people’s food lists. The principal references are the Tortoise Trust, the British Chelonia Group, The Tortoise Table plant database and published veterinary and field research.

Each record carries an evidence level. Ninety of the 105 sit at high, meaning guidance is consistent across strong sources. Fifteen sit at moderate, where sources are thinner or partially disagree, and those are flagged rather than written up with false confidence.

Where sources conflict, we follow the specialist and veterinary position and say so. Large pet-advice sites commonly describe carrots, cucumber and kale as safe for tortoises generally, while UK specialist organisations treat root vegetables as something to limit or avoid and salad as low-fibre filler. Our sources and review policy sets out the full hierarchy.

Check one food

For anything not covered above, the tortoise food checker searches all 105 records and returns a verdict for your species group with the reasoning, preparation notes and sources behind it. Searches that find nothing are logged, which is how the directory grows.

This is husbandry information rather than clinical advice. See our veterinary disclaimer.

Last reviewed: September 2026.