sulcata inside or outside?

ok i live in nj my sulcata is 2.5 yrs old he lives now inside in a 7 ft x 5 ft pen for winter and is outside in 8ft x 6 ft greenhouse pen from march to nov. i was at home depot today looking at sheds for the future yrs. comming up. i could also make a lg pen in basement. temps here in winter are occ. 60s to sometimes low teens at night. not sure what to do i feel safer in basement wich is 55 to 60 constantly.

If you can afford to house him outside in a heated enclosure, then that's what I would do. That is what I will be doing for my leopard once he is too large to house inside. That way, when it is nice enough to graze a little, he can. Just make sure he is locked inside the heated tort house at night time. BTW, I live in Chicago.

You will have to do a fair amount of sealing and insulating to get a shed to work outdoors there. Then you'll have to figure out the best way to heat it. Good luck.

ya it would be fully heavily insulated and have oil filled heater. i saw shed that ha half plexi glass side that looks interesting?

I live just southeast of Washington DC, I have 2 sulcatas that stay outside all year and from experience I have found that in cold climates the most important thing in heating a tortoise house is having heat from the floor, not the whole floor necessarily, but a section for them to get on of they want to. The whole bottom should be insulated with a material that moisture will not affect though. One of my houses has a 3x4 ft heat mat and the other has a 1x3 ft mat, In the smaller house the 3x4 ft, 80 watt mat is the only source of heat needed all winter and we got down to 10 degrees several nights and had almost a week where we didn't get above 32, Basically spend your time and money on a good insulation job, and save on the electric bill.

really, interesting...what are your air temps inside the sheds? do u use just plain wood floor o do u have a substrate down? do u breed them?

argus333 said:

really, interesting...what are your air temps inside the sheds? do u use just plain wood floor o do u have a substrate down? do u breed them?

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I keep track of the temps just inside the double flapped doors which is the coolest temp in both houses with inside- outside thermometers, and right now with an air temp of 28 degrees they are reading 70 for the small house and 68 for the larger house,which means they are sleeping in temps of the mid 80s. the floors are insulated with several types of insulation, with roll pvc towards the ground and a sub flooring of treated plywood, the larger house is finished with an imitation hardwood flooring made of some kind of rubber that is water proof after installation and the smaller house has a pvc floor. I don't use a substrate, they make their own, and get really pissed when I clean them out. No I do not breed them I've had one since 1996 and the other came to me last Sept after the death of a old friend, in fact they have never seen each other.