Help determining sex

[TurtleyRoe]

Hello everyone!

I recently bought my son a Russian tortoise for his birthday. The person I bought “her” from was adamant that she’s a girl. I’m not 100% convinced. I’ve attached pictures of her tail. Is she a she, or a he-she ? Thank you!

 

[Ink]

I believe female too. However wait for more opinions. Does she ( my opinion) have a name? Welcome to the forum

 

[wellington]

Looks female to me. A males tail is much bigger.

 

[TurtleyRoe]

I believe female too. However wait for more opinions. Does she ( my opinion) have a name? Welcome to the forum

My son named her “Turtley” lol He’s allergic to most animals with fur, so he was sooo excited to get her. He didn’t think he’d ever have a pet. I got him the book “who wants a tortoise” about a little girl that gets a tortoise for her birthday and he loves it. Highly recommend! Thank you for your input, I really appreciate it!

 

[Ink]

So wonderful. Love the name too. Please ask questions on the forum about care, concerns or just a hello.

 

[Littleredfootbigredheart]

Welcome to the forum!!

You definitely have a girl imo

I don’t suppose you’d mind sharing how you’re keeping her? It’s really good to check with newer members, especially those who are new too this, there’s far too much misinformation and outdated care out there unfortunately! We can help advise with absolutely everything tortoise related!

Indoor or outdoor set up? What size?
What are your temperatures like? Ie basking spot(directly under bulb), overall day temps, night temps?
What kind of lighting&heating are you using specifically? Packaging photos are good if you have any!
Are you using indoor uv? Is so what kind?
How’s humidity? What are you using for substrate?
How’s her diet been with you so far?

Any answers to those questions along with a photo of the full set up would be wonderful if you’re willing to share!

 

[TurtleyRoe]

Welcome to the forum!!

You definitely have a girl imo

I don’t suppose you’d mind sharing how you’re keeping her? It’s really good to check with newer members, especially those who are new too this, there’s far too much misinformation and outdated care out there unfortunately! We can help advise with absolutely everything tortoise related!

Indoor or outdoor set up? What size?
What are your temperatures like? Ie basking spot(directly under bulb), overall day temps, night temps?
What kind of lighting&heating are you using specifically? Packaging photos are good if you have any!
Are you using indoor uv? Is so what kind?
How’s humidity? What are you using for substrate?
How’s her diet been with you so far?

Any answers to those questions along with a photo of the full set up would be wonderful if you’re willing to share!

Hi!
I would love input on all of the above. I tried to do a lot of research before bringing her home, but I still feel a little bit unsure about it all.

We live in CO so I’m hoping to build her an outdoor enclosure next summer. Right now I take her outside once a day for an hour and sit with her while she explores the yard. She loves it and zooms all over. She will try to climb the walls of her tortoise house when we come back in if she wasn’t out long enough it seems.

As for her indoor setup, I got a tortoise house. I added a mixture of coconut fiber substrate, repti bark, and alfalfa hay (pet store recommended this mixture). I add water to it all to keep it from being totally dry but not wet either. I got a uva/uvb strip light and a heat lamp. I’m wondering if I need a different heat lamp set up, because if I use it on the heat lamp arm on the tortoise house, it’s too high and doesn’t provide enough heat so I place it on the wire when I’m home. I have a digital thermometer that reads mid-80s to low 90s during the day and I turn the lights & lamp off at night. I think as it gets colder I might need to add heat at night since I keep my heat around 65-67 in my house.
Diet-wise I have been giving her mixed collard greens, cucumber, and she will eat the grass in my yard when she’s out getting her daily exercise and sunshine. She didn’t eat for about the first week after I got her, but figured she was pretty stressed out with the change and being brought into a house with two young rambunctious boys (and the neighborhood boys). I bought Fluker’s repta calcium to add occasionally to her food too. She’s had a few bowel movements that look like grass and some of the white whatever it’s called. I’ll look in the forum and see what it’s called. Soft mushy white stuff..

I’ll attach photos to see if that helps with guidance. I’m totally open to suggestions on things to change to make her more comfortable and safe. Thank you for offering to help guide me with her care!

 

[Littleredfootbigredheart]

Hi!
I would love input on all of the above. I tried to do a lot of research before bringing her home, but I still feel a little bit unsure about it all.

We live in CO so I’m hoping to build her an outdoor enclosure next summer. Right now I take her outside once a day for an hour and sit with her while she explores the yard. She loves it and zooms all over. She will try to climb the walls of her tortoise house when we come back in if she wasn’t out long enough it seems.

As for her indoor setup, I got a tortoise house. I added a mixture of coconut fiber substrate, repti bark, and alfalfa hay (pet store recommended this mixture). I add water to it all to keep it from being totally dry but not wet either. I got a uva/uvb strip light and a heat lamp. I’m wondering if I need a different heat lamp set up, because if I use it on the heat lamp arm on the tortoise house, it’s too high and doesn’t provide enough heat so I place it on the wire when I’m home. I have a digital thermometer that reads mid-80s to low 90s during the day and I turn the lights & lamp off at night. I think as it gets colder I might need to add heat at night since I keep my heat around 65-67 in my house.
Diet-wise I have been giving her mixed collard greens, cucumber, and she will eat the grass in my yard when she’s out getting her daily exercise and sunshine. She didn’t eat for about the first week after I got her, but figured she was pretty stressed out with the change and being brought into a house with two young rambunctious boys (and the neighborhood boys). I bought Fluker’s repta calcium to add occasionally to her food too. She’s had a few bowel movements that look like grass and some of the white whatever it’s called. I’ll look in the forum and see what it’s called. Soft mushy white stuff..

I’ll attach photos to see if that helps with guidance. I’m totally open to suggestions on things to change to make her more comfortable and safe. Thank you for offering to help guide me with her care! View attachment 380957

Thank you so much for the detailed reply and photos! They really help when pointing you in the right direction. I hate to be the bearer of bad news in that the pet store has sold you the type wrong set up and equipment, we see it all too often here unfortunately, it’s so frustrating they do this to people to make money at the expense of the animals they’re selling. 99% of pet stores have zero clue on how to house a tortoise correctly

The good news is you’ve found the forum and we can help getting you on the right track!

First up is sizing, far too many stores will try to tell you they can live happily in tiny set ups, it’s just not the case, despite their small stature, they need a minimum of a 8x4 foot space as adults, they’d roam miles in the wild, it’s so important for their health and well being. Those popular tortoise houses simply don’t provide enough roaming room.
For substrates, coco coir and reptibark is a fine choice but I’d definitely remove the hay, whilst Russians will nibble fresh grass outside if they have access to it, they aren’t actually a grass eating species, dry hay isn’t necessary and doesn’t make a good substrate choice due to moulding easily, that and it’s not really a good idea to encourage them eating substrate.

I’m not familiar with the brand uv but it doesn’t look to be a t5 bulb, which are considered both the safest and efficient option. I believe the one in the photo is potentially a cheaper unreliable brand, but hopefully folks can chime in there. Either way the branded t5 tube fluorescent is the best out there.
I also believe the basking light is some sort of spot light which are too harsh, you want a incandescent reptile floodlight, you want that to achieve a 95-100f basking temperature directly underneath, the rest of the enclosure ranging 75-80 during the day.

Hopefully you’ll find this thread I made on housing adults indoor helpful! it covers correct equipment(lighting, heating, uv), levels, sizing, appropriately maintaining humidity, substrates, there’s lots of visual examples for everything and a really handy diet link to check out!

Housing adult Russian and Hermans indoors

Hello there! In this thread I’m going to include some information an example of an appropriate indoor set up for an older Herman/russian. As much as it’s encouraged to have tortoises in a safe outdoor enclosure, I understand being from the uk myself, that some climates make it difficult to...

tortoiseforum.org

This one can also really good to familiarise yourself with, it’ll help you avoid the wrong bulbs, substrates, housing etc, I always encourage double checking purchases on the forum too

Common keeping errors

Hello everyone! I’d been a long time lurker on this site long before joining just under a year ago now, over that time I’ve seen these husbandry issues come up time and time again, sometimes with dire consequences☹️ I thought this thread might serve as a good visual guide for these common...

tortoiseforum.org

Just a heads up, with the uv timing, every other source of information will tell you 12hours of uv. This is essentially an old fashioned rule that has stuck with a lot of keepers, it stems from the presumption that once the basking light or ambient lighting is on, ie the ‘sun’, that uv must coexist the same amount of hours. Fact is, uv rays only peak for a few hours a day, anyone with a uv meter will confirm this. No tortoise is blasted with 12 hours of uv in the wild, therefore it’s not necessary in captivity.
The uv bulbs are much more expensive to replace once their uv strength diminishes, so it’s definitely best having it on a 4 hour timer that provides them with all the uv they need, saving your bulb life.
Then some cheaper led lighting for your ambient 12 hour light cycle as well as the basking light on the same 12hrs, your ceramics will run 24/7 on the thermostat, hopefully that will all make more sense once you read through the thread!

Hope they help! As always, happy to answer anything further!

 

[TurtleyRoe]

Thank you so much for the detailed reply and photos! They really help when pointing you in the right direction. I hate to be the bearer of bad news in that the pet store has sold you the type wrong set up and equipment, we see it all too often here unfortunately, it’s so frustrating they do this to people to make money at the expense of the animals they’re selling. 99% of pet stores have zero clue on how to house a tortoise correctly

The good news is you’ve found the forum and we can help getting you on the right track!

First up is sizing, far too many stores will try to tell you they can live happily in tiny set ups, it’s just not the case, despite their small stature, they need a minimum of a 8x4 foot space as adults, they’d roam miles in the wild, it’s so important for their health and well being. Those popular tortoise houses simply don’t provide enough roaming room.
For substrates, coco coir and reptibark is a fine choice but I’d definitely remove the hay, whilst Russians will nibble fresh grass outside if they have access to it, they aren’t actually a grass eating species, dry hay isn’t necessary and doesn’t make a good substrate choice due to moulding easily, that and it’s not really a good idea to encourage them eating substrate.

I’m not familiar with the brand uv but it doesn’t look to be a t5 bulb, which are considered both the safest and efficient option. I believe the one in the photo is potentially a cheaper unreliable brand, but hopefully folks can chime in there. Either way the branded t5 tube fluorescent is the best out there.
I also believe the basking light is some sort of spot light which are too harsh, you want a incandescent reptile floodlight, you want that to achieve a 95-100f basking temperature directly underneath, the rest of the enclosure ranging 75-80 during the day.

Hopefully you’ll find this thread I made on housing adults indoor helpful! it covers correct equipment(lighting, heating, uv), levels, sizing, appropriately maintaining humidity, substrates, there’s lots of visual examples for everything and a really handy diet link to check out!

Housing adult Russian and Hermans indoors

Hello there! In this thread I’m going to include some information an example of an appropriate indoor set up for an older Herman/russian. As much as it’s encouraged to have tortoises in a safe outdoor enclosure, I understand being from the uk myself, that some climates make it difficult to...

tortoiseforum.org

This one can also really good to familiarise yourself with, it’ll help you avoid the wrong bulbs, substrates, housing etc, I always encourage double checking purchases on the forum too

Common keeping errors

Hello everyone! I’d been a long time lurker on this site long before joining just under a year ago now, over that time I’ve seen these husbandry issues come up time and time again, sometimes with dire consequences☹️ I thought this thread might serve as a good visual guide for these common...

tortoiseforum.org

Just a heads up, with the uv timing, every other source of information will tell you 12hours of uv. This is essentially an old fashioned rule that has stuck with a lot of keepers, it stems from the presumption that once the basking light or ambient lighting is on, ie the ‘sun’, that uv must coexist the same amount of hours. Fact is, uv rays only peak for a few hours a day, anyone with a uv meter will confirm this. No tortoise is blasted with 12 hours of uv in the wild, therefore it’s not necessary in captivity.
The uv bulbs are much more expensive to replace once their uv strength diminishes, so it’s definitely best having it on a 4 hour timer that provides them with all the uv they need, saving your bulb life.
Then some cheaper led lighting for your ambient 12 hour light cycle as well as the basking light on the same 12hrs, your ceramics will run 24/7 on the thermostat, hopefully that will all make more sense once you read through the thread!

Hope they help! As always, happy to answer anything further!

Thank you so much! Do you have any links to lights and lamps I could use? Maybe there’s links in the forum you linked. I’ll work on building her a larger set up soon and remove the hay. I’m a visual/hands on learner so having someone to help “walk me through it” is so helpful! Thank you again!

 

[SinLA]

Hopefully the thread above will help you, just know that most pet stores give bad information, and it looks like yours is included. That house is way way too small for an adult Russian. You want something in the neighborhood of 4' x 8' and hay is not appropriate for Russians (they don't eat it, it will likely get moldy). Not only is that space too small, but there's almost no room for her to walk around, which is very necessary for her digestion. You CAN get several of those houses and "habitrail" them together, but its a lot of effort and expense to do so...

 

[Littleredfootbigredheart]

Thank you so much! Do you have any links to lights and lamps I could use? Maybe there’s links in the forum you linked. I’ll work on building her a larger set up soon and remove the hay. I’m a visual/hands on learner so having someone to help “walk me through it” is so helpful! Thank you again!

No problem at all! Links can be tricky due to location, what works for me might not work for you, for basking see if you can find ‘Arcadia floodlight’ and for uv type in ‘Arcadia proT5 kit 12%’ for ambient lighting, a screw in led bulb in 5500-6500k colour range from the hardware store is fine, or you can look into strip lighting