Feeding dish

[luvmysulcata]

Hi what do you guys use to feed your tortoise in? I have been using paper plates but he tips them and gets dirt all over his food any good ideas???? Thanks!

 

[Tom]

I use upside down lids from butter tubs for smaller tortoises and fast food style plastic trays for bigger ones.

 

[ALDABRAMAN]

We use all sizes of plant pot dishes, usually glazed. Good and sturdy and they can't eat it by accident.

 

[Mert]

We have used the plastic lids from the big tubs of icecream. Now we use a terra cota dish. The saucer part when you get a pot for your plants. We use the same thing for water. Bury it in the ground a bit so it doesnt move around.

 

[MORTYtheTORTY]

I started out with ceramic stepping stones that I broke into smaller pieces but they didn't like it so I bought those smooth colored flower plates that you put pots in from walmart and use the smaller one for water and the bigger one for food...I don't think you can control the dirt because I change the food several times a day and I change the water several times a day as they poop ALOT and drag dirt. They poop while soaking 1-2x every morning and poop all day, most days, in their water and food bowls....they constantly drag dirt into their water and I like it clean so I'm pretty anal and the coconut coir soaks up alot of water so unless there's poop in it I throw it away, otherwise I put it back in with the substrate.

 

[Dagashi]

we use the exoterra small feeding dish. Doens't keep substrate out. We wash it everyday.

Very hardy and we like it as it gives a good natural feel to it. IT's also scrub-able.

 

[Merlin M]

I use a couple of slates

 

[Katherine]

We feed on tiles occasionally if we offer any mazuri because they are easy to remove and clean (thats stuff sours terribly fast) but generally for lettuces, leafy greens, any veggies, or plants/weeds that weren't already growing in their enclosure we throw them around the pens sporadically to emulate foraging and give them a mild enrichment activity.

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Just realized you are looking for a way to keep substrate out of your food dish. In that case my response was incredibly unhelpful, my apologies.

 

[Floof]

I use a little terracotta saucer for my little Leo tort. Sometimes I'll change things up and move it to his basking slate. For my Russians, currently, I use their basking tile (12x12" slate tile) as their feeding station, and, so far, I have failed miserably at finding a way to keep them from dragging dirt onto it. They're like dirt magicians!!

I have an idea for when my Russians go into their permanent enclosure, though. On a different community, someone was posting pictures of their skinks, including a very neat way of keeping the water dish up and off the substrate. She siliconed little PVC legs on to the bottom of a slate tile, so that the tile sits about an inch up off the substrate. The water dish goes on top (and the aspen doesn't get dragged/kicked in!), plus the skink has a place to hide underneath. I'm thinking about tweaking the idea for use with the Russians. A larger tile, an access ramp would be in order, and perhaps even 2 separate feeding stations would be in order. Might even cover the ramp in something like indoor/outdoor carpet to help brush the dirt off on the way up. Hmmm...

Anyway, the other thing that works for me is to just hang their greens. I don't do it at every feeding, more like every few, but it works very well as far as keeping the greens up and off the dirt. Here's a thread I started last month about this feeding style, complete with pictures: http://www.tortoiseforum.org/Thread-Little-shelled-giraffes#axzz1rxm1JBcs

 

[luvmysulcata]

Thanks a lot everyone! ! Very helpful ideas

 

[Baoh]

I use lids from my fiancee's yogurt containers for small individuals and lids from cottage cheese tubs for groups of juveniles. For adults, I have a shallow metal pan for Mazuri and non-Mazuri foods are cast upon the substrate/ground.

 

[IowaGuy28]

I bought a 'decent' sized rock-shaped food dish from a pet store, like something you'd use for a lizard. My Tilley (African Sulcata) eats right out of it, he does make some mess and hes big enough to climb in this....dish(?) But it works.

 

[StudentoftheReptile]

Right now, anything flat and shallow that the wife will let me use! lol.

Seriously, I have a small collection of saucers, reptile food dishes, and dogfood can lids that I wash and rotate out every few days for all the baby torts. They all seem to work well enough. I also use a big piece of slate rock for the sulcata.

 

[tyler0912]

I use a £14.99 Reptile foodbowl -.-
Seems a good idea at the time....wast of money... so i put a piece of slate in it to keep the beak worn down!