TortoiseForum.org - Heat and Light and Food!

Hi all!

Please Please don't shout at me!

At the moment my 2 torts are living in a very basic tortoise table with hay as food and substrate. At the moment they get dandelion and clover but that will soon be under snow. They have a water dish accesable at all times and two shelters. They have a zoomed UV basking lamp. I have been giving a calcium supplement a couple of times a week.

We bought our Sulcata's at a reptile fair and consulted a reptile equipment seller for the heat/light requirements. The guy selling the torts said they eat green leaves.

My guys look nice and healthy with lovely bright eyes - pee and poo functioning Wink

But I do worry they are not eating enough with the hay (it's mixed grass and I give extra timothy too).

Please recomend what I should do about light and heat and how to regulate the heat - then I can get my hubby to build them a decent tort table.

Thanks in advance and I apologize if these questions have been previously asked (I did search Sad

.

Piff

As far as heat, go for a couple standard shop light fixtures. teh dome shaped things. Home Depot has them for about $3.
A 120v house bulb (depending on the temp of the area the table is. More or less) and one with a blue or red bulb for night. Once again, if the area stays warm 65degrees or more, i wouldn't worry about a night light.
Ideally, if you could get the guys regular sunlight, a UV light isn't neccessary. Otherwise you MUST have a UVB flourescent on them all day. But if you're getting snow, Id imagine winter sun isn't going to be a possibility.

Thanks for the reply - there is such a wide variety of UVA/UVB bulbs out there - what ones are the better ones to buy?

The time I bought one, I got the "desert" spec that had the maximun UV output.

I am no expert and I don't have a sulcata ( I have Greeks) but this is my thoughts on this subject
Bansh88 I agree. I use the "Desert" spec that is the 10 which is the maximun uv.
Several types of bulbs:
1) fluorecent - have to have a specific balast
2) the new Compact - which give you the same full spectrum of 10 % UVB output. 30%
UVA output as the fluorecent but screws into the base of a standard clamp lamp
3) Mega-ray which is a mercury vapor bulb. One advantage to this is that it is a heat and
uvb bulb in one.
It all depends on your preference. I can't sleep with a light on red, white or blue (ok, now we all know Wink

) and I need a heat source at night for them, when over wintering, so I chose the fluorecent Reptisun 10 for their light source with a ceramic heat emitters for their heat source. I got a Rheostat that turns on and off the heat emitters to keep the area at constant temps, a temp and humidity gauge cause they like it dry, and a timer for the light.
Plug them in set them and your done. The temp stays the same (two heat emitters with different watts so that they can cool down at night just not too cold). They get 12 to 14 hours of light and I check the gauges daily to make sure the temp and humidity are within range.
Here is a site or two to check out the bulbs.
http://www.reptileuvinfo.com/html/mega-r...report.htm
http://www.zoomed.com/html/lighting_home.php

also you can check the Tortoise Related Products area and in Sulcata Central under "Good Grasses for Sulcatas to eat" are lists of foods for your shelled baby.

Hope this helped alittle Rolleyes

piff poff, i think under the tortoise products forum theres a whole thread on UV bulbs that people recommend

Thank you again! Crazy1 - loads of useful info thanks.....now i'm going internet shopping!