# Concrete tortoise hide. Check it out!



## fgately (Sep 19, 2011)

Here is the concrete tortoise hide I have been working on for the past couple of weeks. It is actually a mortar hide (concrete wouldn't work), just in case that causes any confusion. I took a couple of weeks to get this completed but that is because I had a bunch of other projects going on at the same time. 

As any of you who have Russian Torts well know, it they can climb it, they will! If they canâ€™t climb it, they will keep trying! With that in mind I designed this hide so that it can be climbed over by my very curious torts. As you can see in the pictures, they almost immediately started using it. 

The advantages of making a hide like this, is that you get to custom make it to what your needs are, they are very strong and permanent, they are fun to make, and relatively inexpensive. I created this one to fit flatly against the block wall in the enclosure, as well as it being an obstacle that Russian Torts can climb.

I will list some brief explanations of each step in the pictures, and give some lessons learned at the end. 

1. These are the basic materials I used. Not in the picture are a cheap margin trowel and the bag of pre-mixed mortar, both available from Home Depot or Lowes. The screen material is called stucco lathe and the bottle is concrete colorant that I used for the final mortar coat. It is better to use thinner wire to tie the lathe material together. Heavy wire is stronger, but gets pretty hard to work with after a while. Thinner wire is much easier to work with and is mainly used to hold the lathe and rebar (if you use it) together. The mortar is what gives the structure it strength. 



2. This is the completed armature, ready for the first coat of mortar. Notice I included a piece of rebar I had laying around in my garage. The lathe material cuts easily and you just bind it together with galvanized wire. All wire or metals MUST be galvanized or at least zinc coated, if they are to be used in the mortar.



3. A close up of the armature materials (lathe and leftover wire and screen from the enclosure) I used. 



4. This is the first coat of the mortar. This first coat is mainly to stabilize the structure so that the next two layers can be troweled on evenly. Much of the metal armature material will remain exposed at this point. The important thing here is to just get some mortar in the wire. It is helpful to trowel it on with one hand, and then support the wet mortar with the other hand from underneath. Notice that I am working with a heavy duty plastic bag underneath. 



5. The mortar for this first coat is completed, and I am letting the mortar cure for a day or two in wet conditions, under a piece of plastic wrap. Concrete based materials are much stronger if they are cured longer under wet conditions. Not soaking wet, but dampened with a hand sprayer. 



6. Not pictured here is the next coat of mortar. This coat was placed all over the piece to even everything out and to give the structure strength. Almost all of the wire material is covered up at the end of this step. At this point you will need to coat the inside, let it cure for at least a day, and then coat the outside. Be very careful during this step as the mortar is a bit more fragile at this point.

7. This is the completed hide. For the last coat of mortar I mixed a batch of concrete colorant and added it to the mortar. This â€œcolored waterâ€ is then added to the dry mortar mix so that the mortar color is consistent. I made a larger batch of the colored water than I would need for the inside coat, because I wanted the outside color to be consistent. I made a drip edge on the lip of the opening to shed water away from the interior of the hide. The drip edge required two hands to get the mortar placed just right. This takes some practice! I textured the outside layer by crumpling up a plastic grocery store bag and squishing it into the final wet layer of mortar. I completed this last step in my garage and wrapped it in plastic. I let it wet cure for several days before I moved it. 



8. The last pictures are of the hide placed in the enclosure. It could easily accommodate several Russian Torts.






Lessons learned:

1. Wear gloves! Concrete based materials will pit your skin, so rubber gloves are best while you work with the mortar. Wear leather gloves for building the armature. The lathe turns into hundreds of tiny razor blades after you cut it with scissors, and the wire just chews up your fingers after a while. A couple of times I didnâ€™t wear gloves and my hands were pretty thrashed. Not that big a deal, but gloves are better.

2. When building the armature, use a double layer of the lathe material. The reason for this is that the double layer holds that initial mortar layer much more effectively. You can probably overdo the amount of wire and support material, but too little is much harder to work with.

3. Work with small batches of mortar at a time! â€œConcrete waits for no man!â€ is a saying in the construction business, for a reason. Once it starts to set up, you may have to throw it away. No big deal though because itâ€™s pretty inexpensive.

4. Use less water to make a stiffer mix, for the initial mortar coat. Use wetter coats for the next two. You will have to experiment with this.

5. Scrape and wire brush loose bits of mortar before placing the new layers. This results in better adhesion. 

6. Spray the prior layer of mortar with water just before you add the next coat. On one of the first hides I made, I didnâ€™t do this. The results were that the dried mortar sucked up too much of the moisture from the new mortar. The new mortar layer cracked as it cured because it dried unevenly. 

7. Do a couple of experiments first, before you attempt the final project. Make a couple of smaller hides or sculpture type shapes. You will learn what consistencies work best, how the layers are applied, and how the curing works. You will need to play around with the mortar in particular if you have never worked with cement based materials before.

8. Your project will probably end up being heavier than you expect. The hide I made here weighs about 70 pounds. If your project ends up weighing a lot, be sure to have someone else help you move it and place it. Do this even if you are confident that you can still lift it on your own. Concrete will not gain its full strength for quite a while, so it is still somewhat fragile for the first few days. It would be pretty frustrating to spend all the time and effort creating a really cool hide, only to have it crack because you tried to move it on your own. If I were to create a much larger hide, I would definately use rebar along with the lathe, and I would wet cure it for a week before I moved it. The mortar will have gained the majority of its strength by then so it would be safer to move. A large hide could be very heavy, so I would also probably figure out a way to build in several handholds. 

Enjoy!

Frank


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## tyler0912 (Sep 19, 2011)

Wow it looks really good i bet your so proud!


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## AnthonyC (Sep 19, 2011)

Frank, you make it look so easy! I'd end up walling myself up and screaming bloody murder til someone came to free me!! It does look great though!!!


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## HipsterTorts (Sep 19, 2011)

Looks awesome!
If I had the space to make one I totally would.


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## jackrat (Sep 19, 2011)

Very nice!


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## Jacqui (Sep 19, 2011)

Really like not only the hide, but the detailed instructions you did for us. So my normal two questions are.... How much did it cost to do it? How much time did it take? Plus what are the actual end measurements?

Now, a couple of more things... why could you not use concrete? What is the difference between it and mortar? Explain to us, if you would, the term: wet cure.

Thanks!


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## DixieParadise (Sep 19, 2011)

I like your whole enclosure set-up. What a great job.....that hide is amazing. Thank you so much for the step by step instructions.. I might take this on one day.


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## Greg T (Sep 20, 2011)

Great idea and it looks really cool. Makes me want to try it myself now since I have step by step instructions to help guide me! 

Thanks for sharing.


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## dmarcus (Sep 20, 2011)

Very nice job...


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## martinfre (Sep 20, 2011)

great work! i need a similar object for my enclosure, but i planed to buy a flower tub, to use the half as a hide. your way is much better. what did you pay for the stuff?


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## Tom (Sep 20, 2011)

Really great job Frank. It looks fantastic. Thanks for the instructions too.


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## terryo (Sep 20, 2011)

Wonderful! And great instructions.


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## fgately (Sep 20, 2011)

I responded to Jacqui's questions, but my answers did not appear in the thread. I guess I'll have to respond from the "Post a New Reply" tab from now on. Oh well, lesson learned.

Jacqui, if you read this, would you please post my response to your questions here? It would save me the time of writing it again. Thanks!

Tom, I am envisioning a large mortar sulcata hide in you future. It would be awesome! You could even use a darker cement colorant to help heat the "cave" by way of solar energy, in the cooler months.


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## Yvonne G (Sep 20, 2011)

Very nice, Frank!!! I really like it. I wanna' come and take the tour and see it in person!

And you're not getting off the hook that easily. If your response to Jacqui didn't show up in the thread, then she didn't get it either. You probably forgot to hit the "post reply" button.


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## Jacqui (Sep 20, 2011)

Wish I could help, but I didn't see the reply either.


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## Turtle Guru (Sep 20, 2011)

That's so cool I love that that is so neat  good job


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## fgately (Sep 21, 2011)

Thatâ€™s what I get for answering a question and trying to post it late at night!

The project cost me about $20.00. If you donâ€™t have some of the concrete tools and cement color it could add another $20.00 or so. The hide is approximately 4 feet long, 17 inches wide, and 10 inches tall at its thickest point. This would take about a week and a half to complete, although I spread mine out over a few weeks because other things were going on. 

â€œCement 101â€ class

Concrete, mortar, grout, plaster, thin set, and stucco are all cement based construction materials (some also have lime in them). Cement is the ingredient that binds them all and actually cures rather than dries. This curing happens through a process called hydration. You gain the most strength from a cement based product by slowly curing under wet or damp conditions. If you have ever had any concrete work done by a contractor they almost always encourage you to spray the newly poured slab with water a couple of times a day for a week or so. This slows down the hydration process, and makes the concrete much stronger. Cement and lime will actually cure underwater! Some of the concrete structures many of us see every day like freeway overpasses and such, actually take 50 years plus to gain their full strength.

Concrete will not work for this project because it has larger pieces of aggregate (rock and sand) in the mix, and is meant to be poured. It is best for foundations, flooring, and for larger construction structures. You absolutely could create a mold and then pour in the concrete to create a tort hide, but you would need to add lots of rebar, and it would be very HEAVY!!!

Mortar is made primarily of sand, cement and lime. This mixture results in a product that can be spread similar to peanut butter and is much more sticky than concrete. Mortar is what masons use to build brick and stone walls. After you place each layer, it is best to spray it with water from a regular spray bottle, and then let it cure for a couple of days under some plastic wrap. If it dries out too quickly, the cement and lime in the mix will never cure properly. This is what I meant by the "wet cure" process. 

If any of you decide to make one of these, feel free to send me your questions if needed. Hopefully you will also post your results.


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## Redstrike (Sep 21, 2011)

Thanks a lot, awesome hide and great instructions to make one!


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## pandacakes (Sep 21, 2011)

WOW! That is seriously a cool hide


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## Jacqui (Sep 21, 2011)

Thank you for the additional information Frank.


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## ALDABRAMAN (Sep 22, 2011)

Very nice indeed!


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## DesertGrandma (Sep 22, 2011)

Excellent work!! It is functional and very attractive too. If it wasn't so heavy I would ask you to make one for me and ship it. Nice instructions for DIY'ers.


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## Claireabbo (Sep 22, 2011)

looks great!


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## trentlee111 (Sep 26, 2011)

Did you by any chance post anything on how you made your enclosure? It looks awesome and something I'd like to do at my new home until my tortoise grows out of it.


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## fgately (Sep 29, 2011)

Trentlee, I did post the finished enclosure, but not the instructions. I thought about several way to build it, and decided to use redwood, concrete, and galvanized wire. I needed mine to be very secure because we just adopted two dogs, we have coyotes in our area, and Russian Torts are escape artists. I wanted it to be permanent as well. The concrete footings go down about 12 inches below ground. 

I am happy with what I have and had fun building it. If I could build it all over again, I would probably go and buy a cheap dog kennel from Lowes, and then mount it onto a concrete footing. Dig the trench, place the concrete supports, pour the concrete, let it cure for a few days, and then install the kennel on the footing. You would have to mount some wood or something to the sides to keep the torts secured from the chain link fence spaces, but this method is probably easier and cheaper. The materials start adding up when you consider all of the concrete, wood, wire, simpson ties, hinges, etc.


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## chase thorn (Sep 29, 2011)

wow thats awesome! :]


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