Leopards outside.

[Tom]

You'll definitely need some supplemental nigh time heat. When it's 80's here it's usually that temperature for several hours which heats everything up (ground temperatures, rocks, walls, etc...), which helps sustain favorable temperatures long after the sun goes down. Your temperatures sound like some cool winter days here, and it's not likely your tortoise will be able to elevate its body temperature long enough to sustain itself through the cool nights. This is just me guessing here, a better resource would be someone who keeps leopards in your area.

I think you are right. And I think this is a large part of why the things the might work in Phoenix, don't work elsewhere. The mornings warm up fast there and everything stays warm well into the night. We have similar highs for much of the year, but we don't get warm until much later in the day than you, and our nights get colder much faster. The sun goes down here and the jackets and sweaters come out right away. Heck, this time of year, the jackets come out before the sun even gets all the way down.

 

[teresaf]

So 50 is the lowest the temperature leopards can stay outside without added heat?

No, I think folks are saying any less than 70 and you run the risk of having a sick torty.

 

[MillerJ]

No. You will undoubtably find someone who says they do that and their tortoise is still alive. Who you will not hear from are the people who did this and no longer have a tortoise because their tortoise got sick and died. Not something those people advertise on a public forum.

Also, everyone reading should take into consideration that the Phoenix, AZ area is a very unique place on our continent due to its unusually warm temperatures. Yes they get an overnight low that is cold sometimes, but they also stay warmer later into the evening and get hot much earlier in the day than most places. They also tend to have a much hotter spring, much earlier than the rest of the country, and stay hotter later into fall. My area has similar winter highs and lows to Phoenix, but our climates are vastly different. Compare for yourself in your own area.

My point here is that what works for someone in Phoenix, might lead to disaster elsewhere. I you leave a leopard tortoise outside with no heat in the 50's, it might survive, in some circumstances, some of the time. In other circumstances, it will die.

If you lock your leopard up at night in a heated area, and keep the temp 75-80, the leopard will thrive and not get sick.

This post it the whole reason I build my nightbox. Yes my leopard can make it overnight at 50f and be fine the next day when he warms up but for how long could I do that to him before he gets a bad cold. The nightbox fixes this by keeping the tort out of the worst temps and giving them 8-12 hours to warm up core temps.

 

[Markw84]

Interesting discussion. Living in New York I think I will stick to 60-70 as a temperature low to leave him out at night. He is 5 years old and he does love being outside. This is my first Leopard. Thank you all for such an interesting discussion.

I think a key to this issue is GROUND temperatures. That is far more important than how cold a night gets. A tortoise lives and moderates everything by finding hides for the stability of ground temperature and humidity. For @Neal the average Annual ground temperature is right at 69°. For New York, the annual average ground temperature is 47°. A huge difference! So a tortoise for Neal, with summer ground temps running as much as 8° higher, will have nice cozy leopard tortoise in its hide in the mid 70°s under some thick bush. But in New York, that same type of thick bush cover will produce a hide with a temperature in the low to mid 50°s. That can be with the exact same nighttime low!!

Also of interest is that leopard tortoises come from a huge range with a very wide range of temperatures (and ground temperatures) in Africa. To say a leopard tortoise (or group) has done fine, does not take into account what clade of leopard tortoise they have, and where in Africa that clade originated. A South African clade bloodline may do quite a bit differently than a clade with a bloodline from Kenya.