Pyramid help

[stephenhall1987]

I've researched online, And attempted to follow recommended diet recommendations. Didn't notice anything about humidity until I joined this forum.

I bought this guy as a hatchling. The breeder was feeding him romaine. I read online that they shouldn't eat much lettuce, but should eat grass. I tried for a long time but he wouldn't take. During the summer I feed Mostly mulberry leaves. In the winter I feed greens from grocery store and repcal tortoise pellets softened in water. I don't feed in sugary or high protein foods.

First two years I had him on hay. This past year I attempted to grow grass in his indoor tank, but it didn't take. So he is just on dirt. After reading through some forums on here, I'm thinking about replacing the dirt with eco earth, and trying to fashion up some kind of humid hide.

What do you think?

 

[Blakem]

Look through the sulcata threads. Tom has created a care sheet that will get you on track and help with your tortoise. Your sulcata needs to be kept Hot, Humid, and Hydrated. How big is it? Whats your setup like? When my tortoise was 2 years old, he was already outside. It's definitely best for them at that age.

As for diet, you need to add more to it. To introduce new items, chop up the new items and place it on top of the usual foods. Eventually, try to include more and more of the new item. Your sulcata will get to an age where it'll try many different things.

Substrate, I'd go with coco coir, that's why I used. It retains water for humidity, which will help with the pyramidimg. Soak your tortoise 3 times a week and spray it with a spray bottle every chance you get. As for a humid hide, nothing fancy is necessary. You can just use an plastic bin. I covered my bins with substrate to create humidity in it.

Keep reading! Glad you found the forum.

 

[wellington]

I would get him in a humid hide for sure. I would also give him a warm soak, besides the dirt, which is no big deal, he looks dry to me. You also need to up the variety of his diet. Mix new stuff in with the mulberry leafs, which is good for him and chop it up. He will have to eat the new stuff along with the old. Eventually you won't have to chop it up.

 

[krh11b23]

Diet does not cause pyramiding. Pyramiding is caused by growth in dry conditions

 

[stephenhall1987]

OK, I purchased some Eco Earth coconut fiber today. I'll work on getting that switched out. Looking into humid hide designs...

As far as diet variety, I'd prefer to offer him "wild" greens when in season. That's why I used mulberry leaves. What else could I give him? I have an elm tree in my yard also. I'll continue trying to get him to eat grass. I might have clover. Magnolia leaves? or should I stay away from evergreens?

 

[Odin's Gma]

I think I read that elm and magnolia are no good, but I would have to recheck. Grass and weeds are the best.
Here is the sulcata diet sheet, tons of ideas there.
http://www.tortoiseforum.org/threads/sulcata-diet-sheet.64290/

 

[stephenhall1987]

His shell is 5.5" x 4.5"
I don't have a food scale to weigh him with. Maybe a pound?
He is currently in a large aquarium, which I expect him to outgrow within a year. I plan on building a large "tortoise table" this winter. I just emptied out the failed grass experiment (dirt), cleaned everything, and filled tank with moist Eco earth. Gave the tort a good soak. I'm still working on building a a good humid hide that'll last him a while.
Here's a pic after 24 hours in the new substrate.

I take him outside when ever I can. I don't have the means right now to build an outdoor enclosure safe from predators.

 

[Tom]

His shell is 5.5" x 4.5"
I don't have a food scale to weigh him with. Maybe a pound?
He is currently in a large aquarium, which I expect him to outgrow within a year. I plan on building a large "tortoise table" this winter. I just emptied out the failed grass experiment (dirt), cleaned everything, and filled tank with moist Eco earth. Gave the tort a good soak. I'm still working on building a a good humid hide that'll last him a while.
Here's a pic after 24 hours in the new substrate.

I take him outside when ever I can. I don't have the means right now to build an outdoor enclosure safe from predators.

Your tortoise outgrew its enclosure long ago. It needs something at least 4x8' right now. Soon, no indoor enclosure is going to be big enough and you will need to figure out how you will house a hundred pound destructive eating machine over your long frozen winters.

Open tables are no good because they are too dry, which is what led to your pyramiding issues in the first place. I suggest a large closed chamber:
http://www.tortoiseforum.org/threads/closed-chambers.32333/

Here are some food ideas:
http://www.tortoiseforum.org/threads/for-those-who-have-a-young-sulcata.76744/

Your tortoise needs to be outside in a large enclosure most of each day at this size, at least when the weather is nice enough for it. Predators are not a big issue anywhere in the country for a tortoise this size in a large backyard enclosure. The family dog is really a bigger threat than a wild animal. Everyone's enclosure and situation is different, so you will have to evaluate yours. We are happy to share insight and help. I live in the country and am surrounded by all sorts of wild predators. I've raised hundreds of tortoises out here and never had one problem.

 

[stephenhall1987]

Your tortoise outgrew its enclosure long ago. It needs something at least 4x8' right now. Soon, no indoor enclosure is going to be big enough and you will need to figure out how you will house a hundred pound destructive eating machine over your long frozen winters.

Open tables are no good because they are too dry, which is what led to your pyramiding issues in the first place. I suggest a large closed chamber:
http://www.tortoiseforum.org/threads/closed-chambers.32333/

Here are some food ideas:
http://www.tortoiseforum.org/threads/for-those-who-have-a-young-sulcata.76744/

Your tortoise needs to be outside in a large enclosure most of each day at this size, at least when the weather is nice enough for it. Predators are not a big issue anywhere in the country for a tortoise this size in a large backyard enclosure. The family dog is really a bigger threat than a wild animal. Everyone's enclosure and situation is different, so you will have to evaluate yours. We are happy to share insight and help. I live in the country and am surrounded by all sorts of wild predators. I've raised hundreds of tortoises out here and never had one problem.

I am grateful for your insight and experience. This is exactly why I came to this forum and started a thread.
I don't know if you realize this, but you come off very arrogant. You are not God and you do not know everything. you don't know how big his aquarium is. There are enclosed "tortoise tables" that could keep humidity contained. Notice both times I put it in quotation marks, suggesting that it wasn't going to be a standard setup.

The side of his aquarium comes off to allow him to explore outside of the tank. I open it when ever I am home to supervise. I often take him outside also. I do plan of setting up an outdoor area to keep him in the summer, but it is not ideal right now. I am aware that they grow fast, and I had planned it all out before even buying him as a hatchling. When he gets too large to be housed indoors during the winter, I will either convert the garage into a home for him, or I will set up a heated greenhouse.

Although this is my first time keeping a tortoise, I do not consider myself a noob. I researched Sulcatas long before buying one. I postponed buying because I knew I was not prepared at the time. In my defense, a lot of the online care sheets do not emphasize the importance of humidity, and often further give the impression of dry dessert tortoise. When I found this forum, I searched the old threads and read about the issue before posting.
I've successfully kept a 400g Saltwater reef, bearded dragons, ball python, rodents, dogs, cats, birds, etc. I am not a rich 12 year old kid that walked into a pet store and bought something I knew nothing about.


All this being said, I do appreciate your input, and I will read through your 2 threads.
Thank you

 

[krh11b23]

I am grateful for your insight and experience. This is exactly why I came to this forum and started a thread.
I don't know if you realize this, but you come off as very arrogant . You are not God and you do not know everything. you don't know how big his aquarium is. There are enclosed "tortoise tables" that could keep humidity contained. Notice both times I put it in quotation marks, suggesting that it wasn't going to be a standard setup.

The side of his aquarium comes off to allow him to explore outside of the tank. I open it when ever I am home to supervise. I often take him outside also. I do plan of setting up an outdoor area to keep him in the summer, but it is not ideal right now. I am aware that they grow fast, and I had planned it all out before even buying him as a hatchling. When he gets too large to be housed indoors during the winter, I will either convert the garage into a home for him, or I will set up a heated greenhouse.

Although this is my first time keeping a tortoise, I do not consider myself a noob. I researched Sulcatas long before buying one. I postponed buying because I knew I was not prepared at the time. In my defense, a lot of the online care sheets do not emphasize the importance of humidity, and often further give the impression of dry dessert tortoise. When I found this forum, I searched the old threads and read about the issue before posting.
I've successfully kept a 400g Saltwater reef, bearded dragons, ball python, rodents, dogs, cats, birds, etc. I am not a rich 12 year old kid that walked into a pet store and bought something I knew nothing about.


All this being said, I do appreciate your input, and I will read through your 2 threads.
Thank you

Hello and welcome to the forum. First and foremost I think Tom is anything but an asshole and he is just trying to help you out. Not to be rude but you obviously need it as your tortoise is severely pyramided. He wasn't being an asshole, he was just getting straight to the point and trying to help u out. He has helped many of us! He is correct your tortoise may soon be a hundred pounds or more and will need to be housed outside. Good luck.

 

[Tom]

I am grateful for your insight and experience. This is exactly why I came to this forum and started a thread.
I don't know if you realize this, but you come off as very arrogant. You are not God and you do not know everything. you don't know how big his aquarium is. There are enclosed "tortoise tables" that could keep humidity contained. Notice both times I put it in quotation marks, suggesting that it wasn't going to be a standard setup.

The side of his aquarium comes off to allow him to explore outside of the tank. I open it when ever I am home to supervise. I often take him outside also. I do plan of setting up an outdoor area to keep him in the summer, but it is not ideal right now. I am aware that they grow fast, and I had planned it all out before even buying him as a hatchling. When he gets too large to be housed indoors during the winter, I will either convert the garage into a home for him, or I will set up a heated greenhouse.

Although this is my first time keeping a tortoise, I do not consider myself a noob. I researched Sulcatas long before buying one. I postponed buying because I knew I was not prepared at the time. In my defense, a lot of the online care sheets do not emphasize the importance of humidity, and often further give the impression of dry dessert tortoise. When I found this forum, I searched the old threads and read about the issue before posting.
I've successfully kept a 400g Saltwater reef, bearded dragons, ball python, rodents, dogs, cats, birds, etc. I am not a rich 12 year old kid that walked into a pet store and bought something I knew nothing about.


All this being said, I do appreciate your input, and I will read through your 2 threads.
Thank you

Rather than trade insults and escalate this silly response, let me just ask one question. Why would you take simple, experience based tips as some sort of personal assault against you with suppositions of age and monetary status? Arrogant? Or a guy that has raised hundreds of sulcatas and been keeping and studying the species since 1991? No, I'm not God and I'm the first to admit how little I and everyone else knows about this species, but I think you over-reacted a bit there.

Is your glass enclosure 4x8'? If it is, I've never seen that and you'd need a crane to move it unless you built it in place. If your glass enclosure is that big, then I apologize for assuming incorrectly. If your tank is smaller than 4x8', then my first comment stands with no apology.

"Tortoise Table" implies an open top. If it didn't have an open top, it would be called an enclosure or chamber or something other than "table". Ever seen a boa or python housed in a "snake table"? I haven't. They would leave. Semantics perhaps, but I think most will agree that a table implies an open top.

"Exploring" outside the tank is another practice that frequently ends in disaster. How should I word this so its not God-like or arrogant? Everyone who does this says they supervise and make it safe. Then one day something happens and I see them crying in the vets office. You are making a mistake. A guy who has seen the results of this mistake dozens of times is trying to warn you BEFORE your tortoise is killed or injured. Whether I'm arrogant,, think I know everything, or think I'm God, I am spending my time trying to HELP you and your tortoise. I don't get paid for this. I just don't want to ever see another tortoise have its shelled sawed open to remove yet another ingested foreign object because someone who did not know better let it run around the house. If that makes me any of the above, then so be it.

Last thing: One tortoise? Three years? You are still a noob. This is not an insult or a slight in any way, but really, how much first hand experience do you have to draw from? I too was once a noob. I read books, talked to "experts", vets and breeders. Then I learned through the school of hard knocks how wrong they were. My animals suffered because of my ignorance and the ignorance of the aforementioned "experts". My goal here is to share what I've learned over all this time and all these animals so that YOUR tortoise doesn't have to suffer the same fate as my earlier ones did. I don't consider that arrogant, or God like. If someone were to have given me this courtesy 24 years ago when I was starting out with my first sulcata, my response would have been a simple "Thank you."

 

[leigti]

Hello, welcome to the forum. You have already figured out that there is a lot of bad information out there on the web and didn't books, pet stores breeders and even veterinarians. You are now in the right place for the information you need to keep your tortoise healthy it's entire life. You will just get more confused if you check out more sites. Stupid question but is OKC Oklahoma City? If so your weather should be good for a large tortoise outside a good part of the year, and you can build a heated house for winter. When he gets really big you can build a heated shed.
Check out the sulcata section, as well as the enclosures section for some ideas. It doesn't have to cost a lot of money to keep your tortoise outside during the day, you can always bring him in at night at the size. It's at night when the predators come out.
Nobody is trying to insult you so just read the different sections and keep asking questions. People here care about tortoises.

 

[stephenhall1987]

Rather than trade insults and escalate this silly response, let me just ask one question. Why would you take simple, experience based tips as some sort of personal assault against you with suppositions of age and monetary status? Arrogant? Or a guy that has raised hundreds of sulcatas and been keeping and studying the species since 1991? No, I'm not God and I'm the first to admit how little I and everyone else knows about this species, but I think you over-reacted a bit there.

Is your glass enclosure 4x8'? If it is, I've never seen that and you'd need a crane to move it unless you built it in place. If your glass enclosure is that big, then I apologize for assuming incorrectly. If your tank is smaller than 4x8', then my first comment stands with no apology.

"Tortoise Table" implies an open top. If it didn't have an open top, it would be called an enclosure or chamber or something other than "table". Ever seen a boa or python housed in a "snake table"? I haven't. They would leave. Semantics perhaps, but I think most will agree that a table implies an open top.

"Exploring" outside the tank is another practice that frequently ends in disaster. How should I word this so its not God-like or arrogant? Everyone who does this says they supervise and make it safe. Then one day something happens and I see them crying in the vets office. You are making a mistake. A guy who has seen the results of this mistake dozens of times is trying to warn you BEFORE your tortoise is killed or injured. Whether I'm arrogant,, think I know everything, or think I'm God, I am spending my time trying to HELP you and your tortoise. I don't get paid for this. I just don't want to ever see another tortoise have its shelled sawed open to remove yet another ingested foreign object because someone who did not know better let it run around the house. If that makes me any of the above, then so be it.

Last thing: One tortoise? Three years? You are still a noob. This is not an insult or a slight in any way, but really, how much first hand experience do you have to draw from? I too was once a noob. I read books, talked to "experts", vets and breeders. Then I learned through the school of hard knocks how wrong they were. My animals suffered because of my ignorance and the ignorance of the aforementioned "experts". My goal here is to share what I've learned over all this time and all these animals so that YOUR tortoise doesn't have to suffer the same fate as my earlier ones did. I don't consider that arrogant, or God like. If someone were to have given me this courtesy 24 years ago when I was starting out with my first sulcata, my response would have been a simple "Thank you."

I'm sorry if I over reacted, but the way I read your wording was unpleasant. As I said before, I do appreciate your experience and advice. That's why I came here. Yes I am relatively new to this, But I don't like being looked down on or degraded because of false information that I was given from multiple places. I realized I had a problem, and that is why I came here, to find the solution. Before I started this thread I searched this forum and found out about humidity. I started this thread to get more specific advice.

I already know that animals will try to eat anything. Mine tried eating carpet the first time he saw it. I am careful. Like you said, my aquarium is not 4x8, so I want to let him get out when I can.

In my research every one says to build a tortoise table for the young ones. But there are millions of designs and ideas. Even fully enclosed "tortoise tables". That's why I put it in quotations because it is not a table.

Once again, thank you for helping me.

Hello, welcome to the forum. You have already figured out that there is a lot of bad information out there on the web and didn't books, pet stores breeders and even veterinarians. You are now in the right place for the information you need to keep your tortoise healthy it's entire life. You will just get more confused if you check out more sites. Stupid question but is OKC Oklahoma City? If so your weather should be good for a large tortoise outside a good part of the year, and you can build a heated house for winter. When he gets really big you can build a heated shed.
Check out the sulcata section, as well as the enclosures section for some ideas. It doesn't have to cost a lot of money to keep your tortoise outside during the day, you can always bring him in at night at the size. It's at night when the predators come out.
Nobody is trying to insult you so just read the different sections and keep asking questions. People here care about tortoises.

Thank you Leigti. Yes I am in Oklahoma City. Summers often get to 110+ *f, winter isn't bad most of the time, but can get down to 0*f sometimes.
I am currently renting a house while I build my own home out in the country. That is why I am limited on outdoor enclosures. My tortoise will have a luxury suite soon enough.

This is now my go to place for info, despite miscommunication from lack of nonverbal communication.

 

[leigti]

It is sometimes easy to miscommunicate when everything is just in writing. You'll have to keep us updated when you get the new house and build the enclosure.

 

[cmacusa3]

I'm in Tulsa, OK and I will tell you that everything I've learned about my Sulcata has came from this site. I have a lot of experience with Turtles but none with torts. My first Sulcata experience wasn't great, And the little one didn't make it because of my arrogance and thinking I knew everything because of my turtles. The next one I followed the advice of Tom and several others and he has went from 50 grams in November to around 600 grams, smooth and very healthy. These people are here to help and they answer the same questions over and over to help people and the torts. I personally couldn't do it because It would get so frustrating. I wish you the best with the Sully.

 

[Tom]

I'm sorry if I over reacted, but the way I read your wording was unpleasant. As I said before, I do appreciate your experience and advice. That's why I came here. Yes I am relatively new to this, But I don't like being looked down on or degraded because of false information that I was given from multiple places.

I want you to know that at no time did I look down on you or mean to make you feel degraded because you received false information or any other reason. The goal here on this site, my goal, is to learn and share knowledge. As I said, I too got the same bad info that you got, so how could I look down on someone who is on the same path that I was once on? My intent was to offer you a shortcut, that I was never offered. Instead of you going through 20 years or trial and error, or trial and failure, as was the case with me, I was trying to give you the condensed version. "Hey. This is what works." I may be blunt and very to-the-point, but I mean well.

Glad we got through all that and you are still here because that will ultimately benefit you and your tortoise. Sorry for the misunderstanding.