Terrarium maintenance

[Hansy]

hi, I'm a new tortoise owner and I'm wondering how often I should change the ground soil in my terrarium? I have 2 red footed tortoises who are younger than 1 year. I'm using a mixture of Cocohusk and plantation soil that I first have to mix with water before bringing it in the terrarium.

 

[Tom]

hi, I'm a new tortoise owner and I'm wondering how often I should change the ground soil in my terrarium? I have 2 red footed tortoises who are younger than 1 year. I'm using a mixture of Cocohusk and plantation soil that I first have to mix with water before bringing it in the terrarium.

Hello and welcome. The first and most important thing is to separate them ASAP. Tortoises should never live in pairs. Groups can sometimes work, but never pairs. You need two enclosures for two tortoises.

How often to change your substrate depends on several factors. If you are soaking the babies frequently, as you should be doing, they usually defecate and urinate in the soaking water, which should leave your enclosure clean. If you spot clean leftover food daily, and pick up any errant feces, you won't have to clean the enclosure out until they outgrow it and move to something larger.

Check this out:

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[Littleredfootbigredheart]

Hello and welcome! As Tom mentions above,
tortoise of any species should NEVER be housed in pairs under any circumstances, they’re incredibly territorial, behaviours that look cute to us really aren’t, following one another and sleeping huddled up is all bullying the the tortoise world, you’ll eventually see more extreme signs of aggression. Anyone who tells you pairs are fine, have no idea what they’re talking about. One can actually stunt the other!

Small groups are ok when there’s lots of land and the correct male to female ratio.

Substrate isn’t ideal, the problem with store brought soils is, unless you’ve composted it yourself, there’s no telling what kind of plants have gone into it, could be something toxic. Coco husk is quite fibrous which will be an issue if ingested. Is it coco coir you’re using? Sometimes they’re labelled the same so the coco stuff could be fine, but soil needs to go.

Ultimately these two need separating into appropriate enclosures.
I think you’ll find this thread I made useful to look through, I go over correct equipment, correct levels, appropriately maintaining humidity etc, there’s lots of visual examples for everything! And I included a good diet list at the end

Young red foot/ cherryhead set up

Hello there! In this thread I’m going to include some information on an effective example of a starter enclosure for a red foot/cherry head😊 Care advice for these guys is painfully behind, fb pages, YouTube, pet stores, they’re all repeating the same outdated advice, this forum is made of...

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This one is also really good to go over, it will help you avoid the wrong kind of equipment, materials and such

Common keeping errors

Hello everyone! I’d been a long time lurker on this site long before joining just under a year ago now, over that time I’ve seen these husbandry issues come up time and time again, sometimes with dire consequences☹️ I thought this thread might serve as a good visual guide for these common...

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I don’t suppose you could answer how you’re keeping them currently?
What are your temps like day and night?
What kind of lighting/heating are you using specifically? Packing pics are good!
Do you use indoor uv? If so what kind?
How’s your humidity reading? What are you using as substrate?
How’s their diet been so far?

A photo of your babies along with one of the full set up would be great!