Redfoot/Year-'round outdoors/Question

Evereigh Mann

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Hello--

First-time poster; greetings.

I have four Redfoot Tortoises--one a Cherryhead variety--and they are nearly 2 years old. I'm in zone 10a on an island off the Gulf Coast of Florida. Last "winter" I kept them inside, but my idea now that they are bigger is to leave them in a 10' x 4' enclosure I built for them out of lumber. (Side note: I have covered both top AND bottom with galvanized hardware cloth so as to prevent raccoons from entering. The person who gave me 3 of the 4 tortoises advised that raccoons are not a problem; a brutal raccoon attack @1 year ago in a previous open container on the front porch resulted in the loss of one, but fortunately I heard the commotion and the other four were saved. How is it that I see tortoise pens online with no top closure, but yet raccoons do not attack?)

At any rate, the temperature will start to dip soon, and the coldest we get here may be @38 degrees one or two nights each winter although it does not usually get below 50 degrees at night during the winter months. I have purchased a 1' x 3' Stanfield heat pad that I intend to put a 40" x 20" Rubbermaid plastic under-bed enclosure over, with a doorway cut into it. Am I to understand that the Stanfield has some sort of built-in thermostat that automatically keeps the pad temperature 30 degrees above the ambient temperature? Is it ok to put the Stanfield directly on the dirt in my enclosure, or is it recommended that I mount it to a board?

Any/all tips welcomed.

Thank you!

IMG_5140.jpeg
 

Kapidolo Farms

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Hi, good to hear you got ahead of the racoon issue. It's dumb luck, good or bad, that they cause a problem or don't, they are everywhere and it can happen to anyone's animals.

To answer your specific question, yes you can put the stanfield heat mat directly on the ground.

More about what you did not ask, but I find myself compelled to say.

A side mounted heat mat offers a better gradient (mounted on a side wall of a 'night house). When the tortoise can sit on it, it's an all or none heating situation. Tortoises do not seem to have the facility to sort out sitting half way on the matt, and keep switching sides so they could 'evenly heat themselves.

So that entails a night house. If you need to keep it low in height to accommodate the raccoon proof lid, then you could make a low night house, insulate it well, and mount the heat matt on the ceiling, this way is creates a zone, and not a direct contact heat appliance. And most certainly, all heat sources should be on some sort of thermostat.
 

Evereigh Mann

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Hi Will--

Thank you for chiming in.

I'm still confused about this Stanfield product, however. It arrived with little/no information outside of a warning to use the pre-existing holes for any mounting purposes and not drill extra holes. Am I to understand that this mat will *automatically* heat to 30 degrees above the outside temperature, or will I need to buy some sort of in-line thermostat to manually regulate the temperature (I hope not)? Confusing!

The raccoon thing is hit-or-miss, you say? The aforementioned person who supplied me with 3 of my redfoots lives on a large farm and has 20 or so redfoots that he keeps in a 100' x 100' area, and has never lost even one to a raccoon. It still haunts me to think back a year ago when a raccoon knocked the small enclosure (at the time) off the table on our front porch; the one tortoise that was particularly loving and would look forward to having his head rubbed must have figured that the raccoon was another friendly soul coming to play. Needless to say, the other four took cover and I managed to save them. What is the conventional wisdom? Do most outdoor tortoise owners keep them in fully-covered enclosures?
 

Kapidolo Farms

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What the 'automatically' means that at full power it can ONLY make that difference, there is an upper limit to the total heat it will generate, the same thing with seed starter mats. Thermostats can be pretty inexpensive, there is no rational to not use one. Here is one that I have used that is pretty inexpensive https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01I15S6OM/?tag=exoticpetnetw-20

Thermostats do not require you to manually regulate the temp. You plug the heating device into the controller, place the 'probe' in the area being heated, and set the temperature that you want the device to heat to. If the temp is that amount already, or higher, then the heating device stays off. They bring a level of safety into the use of the heating device, so that if you have a 70F day the mat will not necessarily heat.

Racoon conventional wisdom is 'once bitten twice shy, ignorance is bliss'. I think that pretty well covers it. There are ways to secure very large enclosures. Racoons are sorta lazy too, they will always go for small and defenseless over large any day, unless backed into a corner. They are wimps at heart. Some had plagued my Mom's koi pond, I walked up on them and they all growled at me, a single individual who was showing me no fear was skewered on a pitch fork, the howl kept them all away for a year, they forgot I guess. I don't like racoons, I'm okay with what I did.

I am working out some detail on making several outdoor enclosures for smaller tortoises and am also worried about rats. I'll make a large area covered with 1/4 mesh.
 

Redfool

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My 5 RFs are outdoors year round. They are in a low wall open top concrete block enclosure. They range from 25 to 30 years old and have been outdoors for 20 years. I would not recommend full time out until at least 7 or 8 inches long. Raccoons do come into their enclosure but never bother the torts. They will dig up eggs from a missed nest and wash them, eat them and leave the shells in the water dishes. Keeping the pen clean of food gives raccoons no reason to enter it. My warm house is 6.5’w x 3.5’d x 3’t concrete block. It is heated in the winter by two 100w CHEs when temps get into the 60s and 50s. I insulate the house by covering it on the outside with moving blanket pads. If temps go into the 40s a 24”x 36” Stanfield mat is laid in on the floor. Temps in the 30s, they come inside in rubber horse troughs. I don’t use a thermostat but have checked with temp gun and all stay in mid 70s when outside temps are in the 40s. Cold spells are generally short and they soon come out to sun themselves. Along with raccoons, I also have hawks come and drink from the water dishes. Nothing has ever bothered my RFs, they are fenced within a fence. My biggest fear is if we ever get coyotes. Your covered pen will keep out big preds but your biggest fear should be from the littlest ones, fire ants. I have the shell of a 3” RF that flipped and was stripped by ants before I discovered it. It’s my stark reminder to Amdro.
 

Evereigh Mann

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Thanks for these comments.

Mine are all at least 8" long so I think they are ready to brave the Florida winter...

I hadn't even considered red ants. The biggest of my four has a tendency to try and scale the sides of the pen, and in doing so, I find him on his back @once every month. Just because of this, I check on them multiple times each day. Funny; I had this very conversation recently with the person who supplied these redfoots to me as babies, and I told him I'm always worried that one of them will be on his back for many hours and die. He was bemused by my concern, and he replied that tortoises will invariably flip onto their backs in the wild but they don't automatically die--eventually they right themselves. In fact, almost every one of our conversations with regard to these tortoises ends with him saying, "Don't overthink this. These are tough animals that will outlive you. You're overthinking this."

The thermostat looks great, but I will need one for outdoor use. A quick look on Amazon yielded only indoor thermostats. Does such a thing exist?
 
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