Again, I didn't say indefinitely and I didn't say it was ideal, optimal or good for them. I was trying to give OP some comfort that their tortoise would probably OK if he was hunkered down without shelter for a cold night or two as ours has done that before, and we had a couple unusually cold...
Mine has a choice, mine is smart as a dog. It knows what the weather will be better than the weatherman. I didn't say sulcatas could live in 35F nights indefinitely without shelter, I'm just saying mine, which lives within 5 to 10 miles of OPs, has decided on more than one occasion to spend the...
Do you know how he got out? Gate open, dug/pushed thru fencing?
I know you have probably looked high and low is probably gone, but on several occasions I swore ours escaped because I walked every area of our acre multiple times and a 100 lb tortoise should be easy to spot, only to find him...
Put up flyers at the intersections of area of your house. The good thing about Gilbert/QC area is that they are so common that most people are trying to return them and not interested in having a wrecking ball with legs so he will probably turn up. Post on FB community group also and Craigslist...
I think I will give that a go first. A vet told us that was an option when it first appeared but they said as long as it wasn't getting goop inside of the cracked area that caused bacteria or mold to be harbored it probably wasn't a big deal and it would just weather away.
We soaked him when he was small enough to handle. He's close to 100lbs now and will tear out of a play pool pretty quickly. When the property is floor irrigated every couple weeks sometimes he will wade through it and drink the standing water, but usually he almost always refuses to drink water...
Our tort probably only spends about 4 hours grazing the property, walking the perimeter for intruders/mates and retreats to his massive burrow or under a trailer. I would imagine in the wild that they are only active as they need to be to eat and mate?
If be interested to know how long people...
About two years ago our tort had a small chip/crack on a scute. It was likely because his burrow was in the worst possible place where he dug under a concrete footer for a block fence. He would sometimes bang into the concrete footer when he was excavating. The small crack and chip slowly...