New member with Red Foot questions

[Joss]

Hey everyone!
I'm new here, and I'd like to get opinions on how to ensure I'm taking good care of my 3-year-old male(??) red foot, Littlefoot.
This is him

He spent his first years with a neglectful owner, which led to shell deformation and minor shell rot on his underside. I've had him for 6 months now and in that time he has gained 95 grams, and seems to be happy and in great health.

He's 335g and I keep him in a 40 gallon tank, with cypress mulch bedding and some sphagnum moss. He has a heating pad, heat lamp for basking, and a UV light. I try to keep the humidity at 70-80% with the help of a humidifier intended for humans with a hose running to the tank, but I have yet to get that system to be consistent.

I feed him every morning with a base of leafy greens and some sort of fruit or other veggie to go with it, and sprinkled every other day with Repti Calcium. Also an earthworm once a week. He gets baths every other day or so.

Based on your experiences, is there anything I should change for better results? Especially in the category of humidity control, because I want to get that consistent.
Thanks a lot!

 

[Mojo's Mom]

Welcome to the forum!

I'm happy for you and your little guy for finding this place. I joined resently and alot of me questions have been anwered. It's so sad that he was neglected. I don't see how you could do that to an animal... I'm glad that he's with you now.

I'm not really sure how to answer your questions because I am slightly new.

As for the shell rot and stuff I would check out the Health forum. I bet there's lots of people who've dealt with that.

 

[wellington]

Hello and WELCOME . You have a real cutie. Sounds like your doing a good job. I will leave any tweaking to the experienced Red Foot owners. They should be around shortly to help you out.

 

[coreyc]

Welcome to the forum glad to hear he is doing better sounds like your on the right track

 

[Mojo's Mom]

Hello and WELCOME . You have a real cutie. Sounds like your doing a good job. I will leave any tweaking to the experienced Red Foot owners. They should be around shortly to help you out.

Yeah, you should check out the Species Specific stuff too.

 

[ALDABRAMAN]

Welcome!

 

[dmarcus]

Hello and welcome to the forum...

 

[tortadise]

Welcome to the forum. Glad he's with you now. Stick with the calcium as mentioned and your diet looks good. Make sure he has lots of UV, it seems he has developed medabic bone disease. Which is why his shell is a little deformed. Keep him on his good diet that you have him on. And he looks happy now that he's with you.

 

[Zamric]

Welcome to the Forum!

What a cutie!

 

[Radiated]

does anyone else here recommend to cut down the earthworms?

 

[DixieParadise]

No, I think the worms once a week are acceptable form of protein. I would not over feed the to the tort, but once a week is good. I do this with my torts and it works ok for them.

oh, I am sorry.... Welcome and enjoy the site. You seem to be on the right track with your tort now. Just stay with it and I am sure it will all be ok...

 

[Joss]

Thanks for the welcomes and advice, I'm definitely going to be browsing the red foot specific threads

 

[Madkins007]

Hey everyone!
I'm new here, and I'd like to get opinions on how to ensure I'm taking good care of my 3-year-old male(??) red foot, Littlefoot.
(snip)

He spent his first years with a neglectful owner, which led to shell deformation and minor shell rot on his underside. I've had him for 6 months now and in that time he has gained 95 grams, and seems to be happy and in great health.

He's 335g and I keep him in a 40 gallon tank, with cypress mulch bedding and some sphagnum moss. He has a heating pad, heat lamp for basking, and a UV light. I try to keep the humidity at 70-80% with the help of a humidifier intended for humans with a hose running to the tank, but I have yet to get that system to be consistent.

I feed him every morning with a base of leafy greens and some sort of fruit or other veggie to go with it, and sprinkled every other day with Repti Calcium. Also an earthworm once a week. He gets baths every other day or so.

Based on your experiences, is there anything I should change for better results? Especially in the category of humidity control, because I want to get that consistent.
Thanks a lot!

Raising humidity without ending up with wet substrate and shell rot is a pain. There are a few basic ideas to consider...

1. Control loss. A lot of the problem is usually that the rising warm air carries most of our humidity out with it. The most effective way to prevent this is to cover the tank pretty much totally.

2. Constant creation. If you are always creating high levels of humidity at the ground level, then you can tolerate a lot more loss. Humidifiers and misters, etc. work nicely. One interesting option is basically to run a tropical fish tank in the habitat- some sort of stable, safe container of water with a heater. It is even more effective if there is a bubbler in it. If the tank is big enough, it can have fish and everything in it!

3. Deep substrates. A respected keeper on some other forum pushes this and it makes sense. Run a substrate that can do some wicking and make it very deep- 4" would probably be the very minimum. The idea is to keep the bottom level wet and the top level dry.

Combine #3 with a covered tank (#1), and the wet bottom layer should yield humidity whenever the airspace gets dry. Use amount of airflow to control amount of humidity.

 

[TORTOISEMAN1]

Cool little guy!