Hello wise tortoise people!
My name is Rebecca. A couple weeks ago my husband and I were given two desert torts by a neighbor who had to move rather abruptly and couldn't take them. They're darling -- Gomez, 5, and Morticia, 3, and have been raised indoors together by this neighbor since they were hatchlings.
I'm not sure why he picked my husband and me to give the torts to -- we don't really know the guy, have no pets or kids and, aside from having a nice fenced yard in Southern California's San Fernando Valley, possess no special qualities to equip us for tortoise parentage. Frankly, we have no idea what we're doing. But we couldn't seem to say no, and these little dinosaurs have completely charmed us.
Anyway, we've turned about an 80-square-foot raised flower bed in our back yard into a sandy enclosure, built a small, south-facing burrow, added some rocks and drought-happy native plants and grasses. Eventually Gomez and Morticia will have the run of the whole yard, but we recently moved in and it hasn't been landscaped yet, jacuzzi hasn't been fenced, etc., so they are chilling in the flower bed for now.
For food, we've been giving them dandelions, mixed greens and shredded zucchini. I understand they need more nutritionally, but I'm a little confused about the varieties of pet store feeds that are out there and what's good and what's not, and would welcome advice on that.
Is there anything we can do to ease their transition to living outdoors in a new environment? The first few days they were very timid. Now they come out when they hear our voices and walk toward us. They seem pretty jolly by about 8am every day, walking their terrain and noshing and soaking up rays till the day heats up. At night they retire either to the burrow or to a nook of their own making.
The one thing that worries me is that I see them yawning a lot the last couple days. I read somewhere this is an early symptom of a respiratory infection. Can anyone advise? Is there anything about our setup that could be causing trouble? It's been unseasonably cool in LA the last few days and I wonder if moving from my neighbor's laundry room to my yard was a little traumatizing. I also worry because a landscaping crew has been kicking up a lot of dust, etc.
I think their prior parent loved them, but I'm not sure he totally knew what he was doing. After all, he dropped them on us and we definitely don't!
Anyway, any and all guidance is appreciated.
P.S. I keep trying to attach a pic. I'm not sure if it worked.
My name is Rebecca. A couple weeks ago my husband and I were given two desert torts by a neighbor who had to move rather abruptly and couldn't take them. They're darling -- Gomez, 5, and Morticia, 3, and have been raised indoors together by this neighbor since they were hatchlings.
I'm not sure why he picked my husband and me to give the torts to -- we don't really know the guy, have no pets or kids and, aside from having a nice fenced yard in Southern California's San Fernando Valley, possess no special qualities to equip us for tortoise parentage. Frankly, we have no idea what we're doing. But we couldn't seem to say no, and these little dinosaurs have completely charmed us.
Anyway, we've turned about an 80-square-foot raised flower bed in our back yard into a sandy enclosure, built a small, south-facing burrow, added some rocks and drought-happy native plants and grasses. Eventually Gomez and Morticia will have the run of the whole yard, but we recently moved in and it hasn't been landscaped yet, jacuzzi hasn't been fenced, etc., so they are chilling in the flower bed for now.
For food, we've been giving them dandelions, mixed greens and shredded zucchini. I understand they need more nutritionally, but I'm a little confused about the varieties of pet store feeds that are out there and what's good and what's not, and would welcome advice on that.
Is there anything we can do to ease their transition to living outdoors in a new environment? The first few days they were very timid. Now they come out when they hear our voices and walk toward us. They seem pretty jolly by about 8am every day, walking their terrain and noshing and soaking up rays till the day heats up. At night they retire either to the burrow or to a nook of their own making.
The one thing that worries me is that I see them yawning a lot the last couple days. I read somewhere this is an early symptom of a respiratory infection. Can anyone advise? Is there anything about our setup that could be causing trouble? It's been unseasonably cool in LA the last few days and I wonder if moving from my neighbor's laundry room to my yard was a little traumatizing. I also worry because a landscaping crew has been kicking up a lot of dust, etc.
I think their prior parent loved them, but I'm not sure he totally knew what he was doing. After all, he dropped them on us and we definitely don't!
Anyway, any and all guidance is appreciated.
P.S. I keep trying to attach a pic. I'm not sure if it worked.
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