Survey(ish): To use artificial UVB or not. THAT is the question.

[biochemnerd808]

Ok, before anyone starts freaking out, our RF has been spending warm days outside, and she DOES have a UVB light in her indoor enclosure.

HOWEVER, doing (a lot) of reading online, about half of the care sheets state that RFs get their D3 from their diet, and as long as they spend time outside in the summer, no artificial UVB needs to be provided. The animals shown in the pictures taken by the writer(s) of the sheet are healthy and smooth.

SO: I would love to see here how many of you keep your RFs with or without artificial UVB, and if you have any insights on the matter one way or another, I would love to hear them.

Our little rescued RF (just shy of 6" - not a baby, but not adult) was kept in a bone-dry, too-small environment before coming into our family, so at this point, ANYTHING is an improvement, but I would like to do things 'right'...

 

[Yvonne G]

I'm babysitting two redfooted tortoises for a forum member while he is out of the country on a teaching engagement. During the winter they are in a covered pen on my car port - no sunshine at all. All I provide for them is a regular 100 watt incandescent light that's on at 7a and off at 7p. During the summer they're outside 24/7.

In my opinion, when you have small ones that have to be kept in the house, the tube-type fluorescent bulbs do very nicely providing the UVB they require.

 

[abclements]

I agree with Yvonne. As long as you get the outside a lot during the summer you should be good. That being said, mine has artificial uvb, but he stays inside a lot due to the extreme temps and dryness here.

 

[Levi the Leopard]

Are you only interested in the responses regarding specifically the Redfoots?
Would learning about other species being kept without artificial UV be of any benefit to you?

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[Tom]

I don't do RFs, but none of my tortoises get artificial UV. Sometimes they go a month in the winter with no sunshine and only regular incandescent bulbs for heat in their indoor enclosures. They get sunshine nearly every day the rest of the year.

 

[ShellyTurtlesCats]

I think artificial UVB is fine as long as they get daily sunlight, too.

 

[biochemnerd808]

Well, initially my question pertained specifically to redfoots, since they do eat animal protein, thereby providing the D3 necessary to absorb calcium into their bones. Intuitively it seems like the sources that say that artificial UVB is not necessary during the winter for RFs if they get animal protein year round (small portions, I know), and if they have natural sunlight in the summer.

The nerd is curious to hear about other species without artificial UVB, @Team Gomberg. My Russian torts and Marginated tortoise spends every non-rainy day outside that is above 70 degrees F. However, we live in the Pacific NW, so while winters are mild, we don't have as many warm-enough days as a lot of other states. On the other hand, the high humidity is an advantage. I do provide artificial UVB to the Russians and Margies during the cold season.

Are you only interested in the responses regarding specifically the Redfoots?
Would learning about other species being kept without artificial UV be of any benefit to you?

Sent from my TFOapp

 

[Levi the Leopard]

None of my tortoises (Russians and Leopards) get artificial UV, ever. I have no plans to ever supply it.
Here in so Cal my Russians live outside full time and the leopards are out daily.
Last winter when my Leopard stayed inside I still did not offer artificial UV. There was at least a 3 week stretch or so when he didn't see the sun.


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[Madkins007]

"Redfoot tortoises get all the vitamin D they need in their diet" is almost complete bull poop. 1 large egg (50gr) has 17.5gr (edit- as mentioned in Boah's post below, this should be 1755IUs, not mgs) of vitamin D in it. That is the daily requirement of a 5lb tortoise (12.5-25IU daily needed), and tortoises in the wild just don't eat that much of any kind of meat product, and most of the wild food (edit- 'meat-type food') they eat is insects which have almost no D in them. (The only plant with vitamin D in any real amount is mushrooms and they have the weaker form of D2 (12.6IU in a cup of mushrooms- not a lot.)(Edit- again, as per Boah, mushrooms are fungi, not actually plants.)

Vitamin D is a fat-soluble vitamin, which means it does not flush out of the body and is stored in the fatty tissues. The big unknown question with reptiles is 'can they store enough real sunshine-generated D3 over the summer to tide them over the winter?' Part of the answer will, of course, depend on how much fatty tissue the animal has- underweight animals won't be able to store as much. Another important part is 'how fast is it using the D to make bones, etc.?' An actively growing animal needs more than one that is pretty mature.

It is very unlikely that the results of 'no UVB' over the winter will show up quickly, so everything may appear 'fine' for years. I have heard of at least one RF keeper who has experienced problems with his herd (poor reproduction, unexplained deaths, etc.), and there is at least a possibility that it is directly related to his UVB policies since UBV/D3 affects reproduction.

Since we do not KNOW the answers to the above questions, providing good quality UVB, or at least a decent vitamin D supplement in small amounts, seems prudent- especially in the parts of the US with long winters.

References:
- https://sites.google.com/site/tortoiselibrary/nutrition/guidelines-and-dosages for dosages
- http://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/vegetables-and-vegetable-products/2482/2 for nutritional data
- Moskovits, Debra."The Behavior and Ecology of the Two Amazonian Tortoises, Geochelone carbonaria and Geochelone denticulata, in Northwestern Brazil". (PhD Dissertation) University of Chicago, 1985, and
- Moskovits, Debra and Karen Bjorndal. "Diet and Food Preferences of the Tortoises Geochelone carbonaria and G. denticulata in Northwestern Brazil". Herpetologica, Vol. 46, No. 2, 1990 for wild feeding data

 

[pfara]

This is an interesting and informative thread that got me thinking about another aspect of using UVB. If torts can see the UV spectrum, and that it can have an impact on their behavior, would it be more "natural" for us to provide it for them? I guess what I'm getting at is: should UVB lights be used not only for calcium absorption, but also so they can see things "in full spectrum" like they would in the wild? Just curious

 

[mikeh]

My take on it is this. For millions of years animals have adjusted to utilize every resource the nature in their habitat has to offer for their most ideal development and survival. Whether it be temperature, moisture, humidity, food source, UVB, hibernating conditions, etc. Anytime we take away any of these natural "nourishments" we are not providing the environment for the natural and probably healthiest development of the animal.

As for not replicating UVB amounts and ratios (perhaps even UVI ratio) to the amounts received in nature, the animal may certainly survive and not show signs of soft shell, but it may be effected with other deficiencies we may not be aware of at this time. We may not be able to observe these created deficiencies much further down the road or not at all.




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[Levi the Leopard]

If torts can see the UV spectrum, and that it can have an impact on their behavior, would it be more "natural" for us to provide it for them?

I have no doubt that the answer to this is yes.

Part of the reason I like having torts outside as much as possible. It's where they were created to be

 

[FLINTUS]

I keep my guys with low level UV lighting, and they get out for maybe 75 days in the summer. My hinges, have an extremely low level UV light when they haven't got out much.
Just an extra note here, there is somebody around on one of the other tortoise forums, that kept red foots inside for many years with great success with no UV.

 

[Baoh]

An egg does not have 17.5 grams of vitamin D in it.

A mushroom is no more a plant than a tortoise is.

Lots of animals get reflected and filtered light. Some get some part of D3 needs met through diet. It is possible to provide all and then some if one so chooses it.

Stretches of no or little UVB exposure, assuming an absence of D3 in the diet, provided they are not excessively prolonged, would not have "unseen" or seen health effects due to the lipid soluble nature of the vitamin. There is effectively a reservoir that can be depleted before trouble starts to come a-knockin'. What that period is will depend on several factors, so any assignment of an interval would be arbitrary (make believe). Likewise, the requirement levels of exposure area and duration at a given intensity for individual animals at different ages, sizes, and species are wholly unknown to me. I suspect that many guidelines are untested and arbitrary (make believe) as well.

I generally provide at least some incidental supplemental UVB as a part of my general practices, but I have raised some animals to adulthood without it. I do provide supplemental D3 to all of my tortoises while they are living inside because it takes some real doing (think intention) to achieve a real overdose in most scenarios.

 

[Madkins007]

My mistake- I wrote 17.5mg when it should have been 17.5IU (international units) for a medium egg (http://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/dairy-and-egg-products/111/2). I must have gotten stuck on grams when I wrote the weight of the egg. I had the proper units for the dosage.

Mushrooms are, of course, fungi, which is actually a separate kingdom apart from plants, animals, one celled things, etc in most methods for dividing the kingdoms up. I used it in a vernacular sense, which since I also try to encourage calling pumpkin and cucumbers 'fruits' was inappropriate of me. I apologize for that as well.

Vitamin D dosages are from Dr. Mader's "Reptile Medicine and Surgery", actual article by Dr. Donoghue. Most of my library is packed away for remodeling the den, but I believe they made mention of the dosages as being 'working' numbers rather than carefully determined through extensive testing. If they trusted in them enough to put them in the book, I am willing to use them as a standard until something better comes along.

 

[Baoh]

Off by another thousand with grams to milligrams, which are not IUs as you just corrected, but I figured it was probably a typo in the first place. Still, better to clarify.

To me, calling a mushroom a plant is even more extreme than calling a whale a fish.

Only those first two sentences were in response to some of your statements (which you have now revisited, so water under the bridge and all of that good stuff). The rest was general.

"Working numbers" would be a very appropriate way to put it.

 

[theelectraco]

I only use artificial UVB during the winter for my Redfoot. The rest of the year my tortoise gets natural sunlight a few hours every day.


0.1.0 Dachshund
0.0.1 Redfoot
1.0.0 Greek

 

[jnh42573]

Def an interesting subject and I am new to the refoot species. I have read an article that says they primarily live in a tropical forrest being very humid and spends 90% of the time in the forrest. I also read that with there carapace being black in color that they attract much more heat then say a sulcata that lives in a desert and has a very light colored carapce. So is it possible that having the black carapce color they can absorb the D3 faster then most and require less UV exposure? I have been monitoring my 1.2 group of sub adults and they hide most of the day and only see them in the morning hours and evening hours. I feel like its too hot here in MD for them but the humidity is good. I too will be bringing in my redfoots for the winter soon as the night temps will be in the 40's in the next 4 weeks or so. I have an indoor setup with heat and did not provide UV lighting but do offer powder form of D3 to there diet 3 times a week and provide this during the summer months as well.

 

[Madkins007]

Off by another thousand with grams to milligrams, which are not IUs as you just corrected, but I figured it was probably a typo in the first place. Still, better to clarify.

To me, calling a mushroom a plant is even more extreme than calling a whale a fish.

Only those first two sentences were in response to some of your statements (which you have now revisited, so water under the bridge and all of that good stuff). The rest was general.

"Working numbers" would be a very appropriate way to put it.

I appreciate bringing them to my attention! Thanks!

---

JNH- May I ask what article you read?

According to most authors, field researchers, etc., most red-footed tortoises live in wet savannahs, scrub forests, and forest edges with a comparatively small number living in actual rainforests. One researcher found that they spend 70% of their time under vegetative cover- but that is pretty typical of many other tortoise species as well.

The black carapace probably helps absorb heat, but the carapace really does not absorb the UVB rays in a way the bloodstream can use them (or if it does, it is a limited amount), and here the red-footed is handicapped since it has comparatively small limbs with relatively limited exposure.

None of this actually answers the question as to whether they need D3 indoors (assuming good sunlight in the summer) though. We really need some good research done on this.

 

[Kapidolo Farms]

Re: RE: Survey(ish): To use artificial UVB or not. THAT is the question.

I don't do RFs, but none of my tortoises get artificial UV. Sometimes they go a month in the winter with no sunshine and only regular incandescent bulbs for heat in their indoor enclosures. They get sunshine nearly every day the rest of the year.

I think I recal points of view of your using MVBs. Did you before? If so, what changed?

Will