New enclosure

[steviequicks325]

Hi all,
I'm building a three level home for my hermann's tortoise but I've read to stay away from heat pads and use mainly lights. My question is, instead of attaching a heat pad to the side of the tank on the lower level should I add another light instead? I wanted to have the top be the basking/hottest area and the lowest level the sleep/cool down area, but wanted insight on what is needed/best. Details: home doesn't get below 70 degrees F day or night, ceramic heat bulb on at night on top level, humidity fan and probe are built into tank, top light is currently 13in from basking spot (should i switch to low profile light casing?), substrate will be fir bark on lowest 2 levels.
Thank you for any opinions and help!

 

[Littleredfootbigredheart]

Hello and welcome!

As cool as this enclosure is, it doesn’t look to be suitable to house any kind of tortoise, each level doesn’t provide enough roaming room and i think you’ll struggle heating/lighting it correctly for a tortoise, you look to be using a spot bulb too which isn’t appropriate. I also wouldn’t use a fan for the humidity
Is this a baby you plan to house in there?

Let’s not take my word for it, @Tom and @Alex and the Redfoot are better at the technical sides than me, so maybe they’ll see a potential I’m not seeing and be able to point you in the right direction for the equipment to use in this kind of set up.

In the meantime though, feel free read through this thread I made, it goes over equipment, levels, appropriately maintaining humidity for babies etc, there’s lots of visual examples along with a good link for the diet side of things

Housing young Russian/Herman

Hello there! In this thread, I’m going to include some information on an effective way to tackle a starter set up/a way you can build a bigger size once your baby is an adult. I know it looks a lot to go over, I like to make sure all bases are covered, I’m happy to break down any information...

tortoiseforum.org

You may also find this one good to go over when it comes to buying the right equipment and materials

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

 

[Alex and the Redfoot]

Hi all,
I'm building a three level home for my hermann's tortoise but I've read to stay away from heat pads and use mainly lights. My question is, instead of attaching a heat pad to the side of the tank on the lower level should I add another light instead? I wanted to have the top be the basking/hottest area and the lowest level the sleep/cool down area, but wanted insight on what is needed/best. Details: home doesn't get below 70 degrees F day or night, ceramic heat bulb on at night on top level, humidity fan and probe are built into tank, top light is currently 13in from basking spot (should i switch to low profile light casing?), substrate will be fir bark on lowest 2 levels.
Thank you for any opinions and help!
View attachment 378758

Hello!

1. What's wrong with heat pads: their surface can get really hot and when tortoise burrows into substrate for the night or to escape the heat it can dig really close to mat and get burned. When you mount heat pad to the wall this is not an issue but efficiency of such heating is questionable.
2. What are dimensions of the enclosure? Tortoise needs pretty much horizontal space to move and turn around, simply because their bodies aren't flexible. I think that a medium-sized semi-arboreal lizard like a bearded dragon would be much happier in such enclosure.
3. There is no real need for a ceramic heat emitter at the top level - during the day basking lamp will provide heat, at night CHE won't help with warming up lower levels. Setting up a radiant heat panel on the ground floor can be a better option. However, if your room never gets below 70F and is a thermostat controlled, no supplemental heat is needed for the night.
4. You also need to account for a UVB source (T5 tube) at the top level and ambient LED lights on every level.