I'm very proud to share my pretty close to done habitat for my two beloved CDTs, Stillwater and Scout. I have been designing this space in my head for a few years, but finally got moving on it about a year ago. Who knew it would involve so many moving parts?? When my husband came out to see the almost finished project a few months ago, he joked I wasn't allowed to be left unsupervised anymore. 
He actually really loves it too, of course.
I wish I could say I did all the manual labor myself, as that's usually my speed, but I really only have an hour or two to get things done while my sons take naps, so I enlisted the help of my friend, and gardener and few of his guys who work for him. It ended up being a ton of work, so I was happy to have their help. Now that it's close to done, I am loving it even more than I imagined. I go out and spend a good portion of my spare time there, fussing and picking up stray leaves, my boys love hanging out and petting and shadowing the tortoises.
So, here's the rundown:
First, we trenched out the entire perimeter, and buried 18" bricks within the trench. Then a ton of dirt had to be removed, since nothing had really been in this space before. It was mostly left over piles of gravel.
Next, we built the walls out of recycled broken concrete from a neighbor's backyard demo. Thank goodness my gardener will meet me anywhere, anytime with his trailer. Between my friend the gardener, my hubby, and another friend visiting from Santa Cruz, it only took about an hour to collect it all and unload it at our house. The wall is held together with concrete, to prevent it from falling over, especially since my boys like to walk on it for fun. The straight back parts of the fencing, I used new railroad ties, stacked three tall.
Then, I dropped a pond liner in for the tortoise pond (as we call it), and ran a solar filter, for continuous water circulation. It's a bit green right now, so any recommendations for how to help with that are welcome. I will probably post a separate question for that specifically.
We added DG to half of the space, and then the rest os organic soil, where I have planted, a couple different types of sage, a blue hibiscus, roses, rosemary, lots of pansies, kale, mustard greens, clover (which is still coming up from seeds), nasturtiums (some I just planted, and some are coming up from seeds), and I still need to plant some Bermuda grass in a few areas under the trees. All the major plants are on a drip system, but I seem to water and top off the Tortoise pond every few days.
Their house is a dog house, painted, and I added a door with a latch, because we have huge "ROUS"es (Rodents of Unusual Size), I mean, Raccoons, that wander our neighborhood at night. They get locked up every evening. I added the coconut fiber substrate, several inches deep, into their house and put a ton of orchard grass on top for good measure. The roof lifts up so we can peek in on them, if we need to.
I may add a sun shade over the area behind the shed, where the pond is, just for added protection from birds, as my little guy, is still kind of little, and many of the plants are still relatively small.
He actually really loves it too, of course.I wish I could say I did all the manual labor myself, as that's usually my speed, but I really only have an hour or two to get things done while my sons take naps, so I enlisted the help of my friend, and gardener and few of his guys who work for him. It ended up being a ton of work, so I was happy to have their help. Now that it's close to done, I am loving it even more than I imagined. I go out and spend a good portion of my spare time there, fussing and picking up stray leaves, my boys love hanging out and petting and shadowing the tortoises.
So, here's the rundown:
First, we trenched out the entire perimeter, and buried 18" bricks within the trench. Then a ton of dirt had to be removed, since nothing had really been in this space before. It was mostly left over piles of gravel.
Next, we built the walls out of recycled broken concrete from a neighbor's backyard demo. Thank goodness my gardener will meet me anywhere, anytime with his trailer. Between my friend the gardener, my hubby, and another friend visiting from Santa Cruz, it only took about an hour to collect it all and unload it at our house. The wall is held together with concrete, to prevent it from falling over, especially since my boys like to walk on it for fun. The straight back parts of the fencing, I used new railroad ties, stacked three tall.
Then, I dropped a pond liner in for the tortoise pond (as we call it), and ran a solar filter, for continuous water circulation. It's a bit green right now, so any recommendations for how to help with that are welcome. I will probably post a separate question for that specifically.
We added DG to half of the space, and then the rest os organic soil, where I have planted, a couple different types of sage, a blue hibiscus, roses, rosemary, lots of pansies, kale, mustard greens, clover (which is still coming up from seeds), nasturtiums (some I just planted, and some are coming up from seeds), and I still need to plant some Bermuda grass in a few areas under the trees. All the major plants are on a drip system, but I seem to water and top off the Tortoise pond every few days.
Their house is a dog house, painted, and I added a door with a latch, because we have huge "ROUS"es (Rodents of Unusual Size), I mean, Raccoons, that wander our neighborhood at night. They get locked up every evening. I added the coconut fiber substrate, several inches deep, into their house and put a ton of orchard grass on top for good measure. The roof lifts up so we can peek in on them, if we need to.
I may add a sun shade over the area behind the shed, where the pond is, just for added protection from birds, as my little guy, is still kind of little, and many of the plants are still relatively small.
