I do have a reptile humidifier going basically all day. Oogway has been eating, and doing good im just worried about temperature and humidity. I currently have 2 ceramic heat emitters to get the temps up.
Hello and welcome!I do have a reptile humidifier going basically all day. Oogway has been eating, and doing good im just worried about temperature and humidity. I currently have 2 ceramic heat emitters to get the temps up.
Thank you! Idk why she made me feel 100% this would be ok. I don’t want to harm the little guy/girl and knowing how hard and dry it is here I will start looking to re-home him/her to a better environment suited for. Thank you for your honesty. Since I have you here would you suggest a Russian for my climate in Utah?Hello and welcome!
Please understand that we are all glad you are here asking for help and the following is intended to inform and help you.
I wish someone had told you before me that this species is totally unsuitable for your environment. Sounds like someone wanted to make a sale unfortunately. They also sold you the wrong enclosure and the wrong heating and lights for this species. You can raise a baby in your climate with no problem IF you buy or build a large closed chamber. Open topped enclosures do not work. That is like trying to heat your house in winter with no roof. Its just physics. It can't work. You need a closed chamber with all the heating and lighting inside to contain all your heat and humidity.
Humidifiers should not be blowing directly into tortoise enclosures. Its not good for them to be breathing those little microdroplets, and that is not the same as humidity anyway. They can be used to humidify the whole room, but that isn't going to help the inside of an open topped enclosure much.
The real trouble will be when this guy outgrows the 4x8 foot large closed chamber and needs a room sized enclosure that is warm and humid 24/7 all year long. They need South Florida weather, not Utah or SoCal weather.
Here is the care info for your species, followed by a bunch of general care info:
Redfoot Tortoise Care Sheet
NOTE: I do not keep redfoots, and I only have one tortoise in total. With this in mind, remember that I am in no way an expert, and this should not be used as cold hard proof of how to raise a redfoot. I used information from great keepers on this forum to put everything together. This care...tortoiseforum.org
Info For New People. Please Read This First.
Hello and welcome to tortoiseforum.org! We are all glad you are here! There is no other forum like this anywhere. We have tens of thousands of members from all over the world ranging from kids with their first tortoise to people who have been breeding and keeping high end tortoises since the...tortoiseforum.org
Questions are welcome. I'm certain this is not what you wanted to hear, but better you hear it now than learn it the hard way months from now after all the damage has been done.
Yes. A Russian would be WAAAAAYYYYY better. I think you can keep desert tortoises in Utah too, can't you? Or am I confusing that with Nevada....Thank you! Idk why she made me feel 100% this would be ok. I don’t want to harm the little guy/girl and knowing how hard and dry it is here I will start looking to re-home him/her to a better environment suited for. Thank you for your honesty. Since I have you here would you suggest a Russian for my climate in Utah?
All excellent advice!These are some greens to feed(bear in mind the lettuce isn’t the most nutritional but fine to add as part of a varied diet);
Lambs lettuce
Romaine
Red leaf lettuce
Frisèe lettuce
Endive(chicory)
Spring greens
Kale
Rocket
Cress on occasion
The odd Brussel sprout on occasion
There’s also plenty of different weeds you can add! Providing you’re sourcing them from an area that is free of any harmful chemicals like pesticides and fertiliser, so be WARY! There’s lots of lookalikes that can be toxic, it might be best to grow your own from seeds online. We add dandelions and broadleaf plantain, I’ll add a link below you might find useful to look through🙂
The Tortoise Table - Home
The Tortoise Table plant database and resource site for Tortoise ownerswww.thetortoisetable.org.uk
Now let’s talk fruit! We remove any pips/seed/stones that are either toxic or a chocking hazard, so for my list, we’d remove the mango stone, plum stone, peach stone, nectarine stone, cherry stones(chocking hazard!), apricot stones, appel&pear seeds(toxic)
Ones we feed more regularly(but rotate cause variety is key):
Mango
Papaya
Pineapple
Raspberries
Melon
Strawberries
Watermelon(not super nutritional but a good hydration boost)
Plum
Peach
Nectarines
Cherries
Apricot
Blueberries
Figs
Guava
Prickly pear
Ones we feel less regularly:
Appel
Banana
Blackberries
Grapes
Pear
Those last ones are more of a treat basis. You can also try cherry tomatoes on occasion but not often.
We also sometimes grate a bit of carrot on our red foots food(not a lot) or some courgette, you can also add bell peppers on occasion, and they’ll also enjoy some mushroom once a week or so!
Hope this helps give you some ideas for variety🙂 we try not to give ours too much of just the one type of fruit in any given week, however she gets papaya pretty much daily, it makes up a large majority of their diet in the wild so definitely get your hands on some!
Also they’ll need some protein every 7-10 days, we personally give ours a head sized protein of steamed chicken breast, or a mouse we defrost from the reptile shop.
Calcium power can be added on 3 feeds a week.
Hope all this helps😊