diff --git a/pageserver/src/tenant.rs b/pageserver/src/tenant.rs
index 1d6f1001db..2f2169d194 100644
--- a/pageserver/src/tenant.rs
+++ b/pageserver/src/tenant.rs
@@ -3134,6 +3134,7 @@ impl Tenant {
 
     /// For unit tests, make this visible so that other modules can directly create timelines
     #[cfg(test)]
+    #[tracing::instrument(fields(tenant_id=%self.tenant_shard_id.tenant_id, shard_id=%self.tenant_shard_id.shard_slug(), %timeline_id))]
     pub(crate) async fn bootstrap_timeline_test(
         &self,
         timeline_id: TimelineId,
diff --git a/pageserver/src/walingest.rs b/pageserver/src/walingest.rs
index 16b245c488..1d14214030 100644
--- a/pageserver/src/walingest.rs
+++ b/pageserver/src/walingest.rs
@@ -1612,6 +1612,7 @@ impl<'a> WalIngest<'a> {
 mod tests {
     use super::*;
     use crate::tenant::harness::*;
+    use crate::tenant::remote_timeline_client::{remote_initdb_archive_path, INITDB_PATH};
     use crate::tenant::Timeline;
     use postgres_ffi::v14::xlog_utils::SIZEOF_CHECKPOINT;
     use postgres_ffi::RELSEG_SIZE;
@@ -2177,21 +2178,25 @@ mod tests {
         let pg_version = 15; // The test data was generated by pg15
         let path = "test_data/sk_wal_segment_from_pgbench";
         let wal_segment_path = format!("{path}/000000010000000000000001.zst");
+        let source_initdb_path = format!("{path}/{INITDB_PATH}");
         let startpoint = Lsn::from_hex("14AEC08").unwrap();
         let endpoint = Lsn::from_hex("1FFFF98").unwrap();
 
+        let harness = TenantHarness::create("test_ingest_real_wal").unwrap();
+        let (tenant, ctx) = harness.load().await;
+
+        let remote_initdb_path = remote_initdb_archive_path(&tenant.tenant_id(), &TIMELINE_ID);
+        let initdb_path = harness.remote_fs_dir.join(remote_initdb_path.get_path());
+
+        std::fs::create_dir_all(initdb_path.parent().unwrap())
+            .expect("creating test dir should work");
+        std::fs::copy(source_initdb_path, initdb_path).expect("copying the initdb.tar.zst works");
+
         // Bootstrap a real timeline. We can't use create_test_timeline because
         // it doesn't create a real checkpoint, and Walingest::new tries to parse
         // the garbage data.
-        //
-        // TODO use the initdb.tar.zst file stored with the test data to avoid
-        //      problems with inconsistent initdb results after pg minor version bumps.
-        let (tenant, ctx) = TenantHarness::create("test_ingest_real_wal")
-            .unwrap()
-            .load()
-            .await;
         let tline = tenant
-            .bootstrap_timeline_test(TIMELINE_ID, pg_version, None, &ctx)
+            .bootstrap_timeline_test(TIMELINE_ID, pg_version, Some(TIMELINE_ID), &ctx)
             .await
             .unwrap();