Making a Room 'Tortoise Friendly'

[Madkins007]

This is a spin-off of this thread- http://www.tortoiseforum.org/Thread-The-floor-is-too-cold-for-them-I-Disagree#axzz1ouAcjcPM

If one was going to make a room in your house 'tortoise friendly', that is, a place for your tortoise to roam 24/7 when indoors, what would you need to do to make it safe, appropriate, and interesting for it? Here is what I would do in our spare bedroom/den.

HEAT/LIGHT/HUMIDITY
- Keep the entire room a comfortable temperature, 80ish would seem appropriate. Use space heaters or other heating as needed. A ceiling fan would greatly help by 'pushing' hot air at the ceiling back down to the ground level
- The room light could be on a timer to run it for about 12 hours a day (varied by season and species)
- I'd probably build an artificial 'clearing'- an area with a ceramic heat emitter or two heat source for the hot spot, and good long fluorescent UVB lighting about 12-15" above the ground. Set the UVB bulb so it ran for about 6-8 hours a day.
- Run a warm mist humidifier to get the room to about 40-60% humidity overall, and use plants, hides, and so on to create more humid areas.

HIDE/BURROWING
- I'd build a 'hide box' or two- basically just a large tub or small 'doghouse'-like box with several inches of soil/coir/sand/mulch to dig/snuggle/burrow in. It would need a good ramp to get up into, and I would add humidity in at least one of the boxes, probably with either a small scale humidifier or by hanging a bag of damp sponges in the box.
- In a corner of the room would be several largish potted, well-misted broadleaf plants to make a nice hiding place, again with additional humidity.
- A fake brush pile of some branches wired together to make a good 'hill' the tortoise can climb or crawl into

OTHER
- A room like this should also be a comfy place for humans to be in the winter, so it would include a comfy chair, probably a small TV or laptop desk, etc. Keep the cords off the floor.
- Visual barriers would break the space up and make it more interesting for the tortoise- a footstool without feet, a line of planters, a bookcase pulled a 'tortoisewidth' from the wall, etc.
- I'd probably rig a large water dish/soaking pond so it sat in a larger shallow pan of rocks to the brim of the dish, with a broad, gentle ramp. The rocks would keep any overflow from messing the room
- I would probably feed in something like a cafeteria tray to help keep that mess contained as well

CLEANING
- Replace and clean food messes and water daily. Remove any poo as well
- Spot treat poo messes with a disinfectant wipe
- Sweep/dustmop every day or two
- Damp mop with a mild disinfectant weekly (while the torts soak or are 'locked' in a hide box)
- Clean/disinfect the humidifier weekly
- Use a mild disinfectant on all walls, etc. periodically to prevent mold or mildew from the temps/humidity

 

[wellington]

With the damp substrate comes creepy crawly bugs Do you have an idea of how to either keep them away completely or to keep them contained in the room/substrate area? I plan on changing my torts room to give him more space. However to do so, he will have the room as his enclosure without bins/tubs. I am perplexed on how to keep the creepy bugs from crawling into the rest of my home. They now are contained to the tubs only. I do plan on changing it out for new. I use coir. I will bake the new stuff to try and kill anything living in it. However I don't know if that will keep them a way for good.

 

[MORTYtheTORTY]

I can't see that working out for some reason...if you put a humidifier in a room won't you grow mold?! Like wellington said about the bugs...IDK what kind of room you have or what your talking about but I am picturing my guest room (a carpeted area) hahaha

 

[Madkins007]

My den has a hardwood floor (which I guess I thought everyone would assume. I cannot see keeping a tortoise on household carpet.)

If the room is only humidified to about 50%, mold should not be an issue overall, and an occasional wipe with a mild bleach solution should prevent and kill any that tries to develop.

Bugs in the substrate- because the idea would use so little, the substrate could be sterilized by heat (oven or sunlight in a black plastic bag), or freezing. You would still be susceptible to springtails and fungal gnats, but in this design, I would keep the substrate pretty dry and just humidify the air in the hide.

Please understand- this is a thought experiment only at this point. I am planning to build a big tort table/mini-greenhouse this summer for the next winter because I think it would be a better habitat than trying to convert the whole room.

But- for those people who really want to let them free-roam, what would it take?

 

[wellington]

I too will be building a greenhouse, with a heated dog house attached for winters. However, I think my leopard is still to small to stay outside next winter. Not really sure how big he will be by then. I am assuming, it will be in about another two winters before he can stay outside. However, I do plan on bringing him in at night. So I am going to do the room thing. I just haven't figured out the bug thing. I can't get over the bugs, they creep me out. I did assume you were not going to do it on carpet. I too have the wood floor. I guess if the coir is kept more in a humid hide, maybe the bugs will stay more in there. I will also be baking it or something to try and kill any thing in it. Thanks for the ideas

 

[jaizei]

To keep the bugs under control, you could try using an essential oil (peppermint oil, etc.) mixed with water and sprayed around the perimeter creating a boundary.