The time spent in the crevice of release before beginning the homing differed among the tortoises. While some left immediately after the day of translocation, the male 942HSL tarried for 83 days then started homing. Homing usually happened during daytime although we cannot rule out homing at night as only very limited night-time tracking was done. No tortoise was observed homing in the company of another tortoise. The homing tortoises usually avoided entering any rock crevices on their way and often slept under dead logs, bushes or fences (e.g. fig 2) until they reached their home territories. However, the males 643HSLand 662HSL after several days of homing began to occasionally enter into and out of rock crevices on the way either inhabited or uninhabited by other Pancake tortoises.
Homing trajectories. — Homing tortoises did not follow a straight line. However, it was observed that individuals that had been collected from the same crevice and released together in another crevice tended to follow similar trajectories moving home (fig. 3). This characteristic movement pattern was remarkable in the tortoise pairs that were interchanged to each other’s home crevice i.e. 576HSL and 594HSL (moving westward to Station 4 from Station 6) and 560HSL and 543HSL (moving eastward to Station 6 from station 4). These pairs amazingly crossed paths each travelling the opposite direction.
An exception however occurred for the pair 910HSL and 662HSL (collected from the southwest of the crevice of translocation) whose homing trajectories initially differed. The female first headed west, then seemed to get lost as it turned and moved farther north. This tortoise however took a sharp turn and approached home from the north. On the other hand, the male partner (662HSL), first headed south but after some days changed its course and aligned itself with the track followed by the female 910HSL. The male 643HSL, also collected from the southwest, first moved southward, then turned west and approached home facing north.