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Dumb question: can Johnathan’s cataracts be fixed (a routine surgery on humans) so he can see Frederick is a guy? As a bonus, he could see food morsels without the need of olfaction.
I also wonder if the loss of olfaction and sight mean Johnathan can’t recognize the sex of a partner even if it was right in front of him.
I understand he might really be a gay tortoise, but he could also be gay by necessity.
He shares his space with a number of female tortoises.
He gay.
Tortoises use sight and have a good sense of sight to be fair but they also use scent from the cloaca to gather information about things like sex of a partner
he knows what he’s doing
He can't smell, either, but he's been with that tortoise for over thirty years and snubs all the females around.
Which is impressive cause tortoises are famously horny and will fuck anything
nsfw?
They also use vibrations to sense partners but I don’t know if they can tell gender from that
Not gender, only sexiness
Frederick got the moves!
also like, the other tortoise is presumably not blind and anosmic, so it knows what's going on and isn't objecting.
or what do i know, maybe male tortoises become remarkably feminine with age?
Not covered by my previous comment:
Apparently doctors investigated cataract surgery several years ago, but deemed it too risky.
That’s sad, because it’s not like he could go blind from the surgery. He’s already blind. Most persons would risk the surgery if there was a chance to see again, I guess he would too if he could choose.
If it is anything like other surgeries done at vets, the risky part with such an old animal is the sedation, not the surgery itself. And with animals you usually need to fully sedate them, as they don't understand that they need to stay still.
This is always risky in older humans as well. My grandfather broke his wrist ~10 years ago from a fall. He was doing fine, they kept him for observation because he also hit his head, and he needed surgery to set his wrist. They put him under general anaesthetic, he vomited, aspirated and they broke 5 ribs reviving him. He was in ICU for a week. Still alive today though.