hi, I have 2 Herman's tortoise who currently live on a tortoise table which they are now outgrowing. Im wanting to make them an exciting enclosure for them with plants etc. Any ideas would be gratefully received. Thanks
Hermann enclosure
- Thread starter Flossyt
- Start date
- Joined
- Jul 8, 2017
- Messages
- 5,942
- Location (City and/or State)
- Low desert 50 mi SE of Palm Springs CA
Hi, and welcome to the forum!
It would be helpful if we knew where you live. In your profile it says you're from "March"? We don't need to know exactly, but what general area. It makes a difference if it's Maine or Arizona...climate is an important variable.
We have a whole subforum on enclosures. Here's a link to it. And if you do a search on the forum for outdoor enclosures, you will get many threads about them.
The best I can advise right away is "the bigger the better". Tortoises need lots of space to walk to digest their food.
Another thing...your tortoises need to be separated. They each need their own enclosure, inside or out. I'm sure they have probably done OK together up to now, but soon one will start bullying the other. You'll see it as following (chasing), eating together (hogging the food), sleeping together (vying for the best spot), basking together (rivalry for the best spot). We humans think it's cute, but the torts are dead serious. One day, the bully will start biting and ramming the weaker one, and it gets nasty fast. The weaker one can get sick, or the bully may kill it. It just doesn't work.
Here's links to a lot of info for you. Read them over, then come back and ask questions. We'll explain why we do things the way we do.
Here's my outdoor enclosure.
www.tortoiseforum.org
tortoiseforum.org
www.tortoiseforum.org
www.tortoiseforum.org
www.tortoiseforum.org
It would be helpful if we knew where you live. In your profile it says you're from "March"? We don't need to know exactly, but what general area. It makes a difference if it's Maine or Arizona...climate is an important variable.
We have a whole subforum on enclosures. Here's a link to it. And if you do a search on the forum for outdoor enclosures, you will get many threads about them.
The best I can advise right away is "the bigger the better". Tortoises need lots of space to walk to digest their food.
Another thing...your tortoises need to be separated. They each need their own enclosure, inside or out. I'm sure they have probably done OK together up to now, but soon one will start bullying the other. You'll see it as following (chasing), eating together (hogging the food), sleeping together (vying for the best spot), basking together (rivalry for the best spot). We humans think it's cute, but the torts are dead serious. One day, the bully will start biting and ramming the weaker one, and it gets nasty fast. The weaker one can get sick, or the bully may kill it. It just doesn't work.
Here's links to a lot of info for you. Read them over, then come back and ask questions. We'll explain why we do things the way we do.
Here's my outdoor enclosure.
The Best Way To Raise Any Temperate Species Of Tortoise
I chose the title of this care sheet very carefully. Are there other ways to raise babies and care for adults? Yes. Yes there are, but those ways are not as good. What follows is the BEST way, according to 30 years of research and experimentation with hundreds of babies of many species. What is...
www.tortoiseforum.org
Why not to keep 2 tortoises together - a lesson learned the hard way
This is a copy/paste of an article I wrote on my blog last year. I've seen several new keepers ask the question of whether they should get a 'friend' for their tortoise, and so rather than keeping on linking to my blog (which feels kinda self-promoting, which is not my intent), I am creating a...
tortoiseforum.org
Another "why not" to keeping tortoises in pairs.
It suppresses sexual expression. Two Indian Star tortoises kept together since they were babies were at about a third to half grown. The "female" was a bit smaller and more pyramided, but not grossly so for say a leopard tortoise, so certainly not an Indian Star they were within a millimeters...
www.tortoiseforum.org
How to make a cheap 8x8 foot outdoor enclosure
A lot of tortoise keepers struggle with finding ways to allow their tortoise the space that they so desperately need. Further, outdoor keeping allows for tortoises to bask in true sunlight, which there is no perfect alternative to, and really brings out their natural behaviors and personalities...
www.tortoiseforum.org
Tortoise Enclosures
Building your first one? Experienced tortoise cage constructor? Post plans and photos of your hard work
www.tortoiseforum.org
