Turtles and ore types / enchants

[Westingham]

Turtles are a madness that I keep contemplating but ultimately shying away from, but I think I just need to suck it up and do it. However, I have a few questions about possibly increasing their returns.

1.) Would it be possible to give a turtle a pick with a Fortune or Silk Touch enchant?

2.) Are turtles able to detect what ore is ahead of them?

I was thinking of having two turtles, one doing the majority of the mining with a Fortune enchant but leaving blocks that should be Silk Touched, and a second that comes afterwards and does the actual Silk Touching.

Am I crazy/dreaming or would this work?

 

[Damoklesz]

1. No. I consider not being able to use Fortune/Silk Touch the cost of automated mining.
2. Kind of. They can compare the ore in front of them with anything in their inventroy slots. If you want your tutle to leave... let's say diamonds and iridium, and broadcast the coordinates to a computer (so you can mine it manually later), that can be done. However keep it in mind that comparing a lot slows down the turtle.

 

[Westingham]

I suppose when mass-mining (turtles, quarries, etc.), the expectation is you're trading the ability to Fortune/Silk Touch with huge amounts of fire-and-forget material.