Wetting down my Desert Tortoises burrow?

[JohnnyB65]

All good reasons for the man made burrows in captivity!

Btw, I hope I was clear.. I wasn't suggesting we leave them with natural burrows instead of the man made burrows. I was simply sharing that adding moisture comes with the man made burrow territory..that's all

Don't worry I understand what you are saying. Hands and ingenuity allow us to improve most all natural habitats.

 

[Tom]

I spray all my burrows down with a hose all summer long. Its just too dry up here in the CA desert.

The roaches will not hurt your tortoise in any way. That is just one reason that roaches are better to feed to insectivorous pet reptiles. If any get left in the cage they won't chew on the lizard, in contrast to crickets. You can keep their numbers lower by using sticky traps out of the tortoises reach.

 

[JohnnyB65]

Well I’ve been lightly spraying water into the burrow the last couple of weekends and I do believe my tortoise loves it. He has been spending a lot more time in the burrow and it may be because of the high temperatures, but when he does come out he is covered in dirt. So I think I’m going to continue the light spray at least once a week. And of course I will stop if he comes out muddy for sure, but it’s so hot and dry here that I just don’t think that’s going to happen any time soon.

I do wish that I could find something to grow above his burrow that is drought tolerant that would provide enough shade in keeping the soil cool and that I can buy at Lowe's or Home Depot. It’s way too late to start from seed. It also has to withstand full hot sun all day, every day and whatever I use also has to be able to handle watering only once or twice a week with a minimum of water.

 

[Levi the Leopard]

Glad to hear.

Have you considered ice plant? It's very drought tolerant, does great in the full sun and makes great ground cover.

 

[Carol S]

How about a grapevine? I have two grapevines in my Desert Tortoise enclosure and they provide a lot of shade plus food.

 

[JohnnyB65]

Glad to hear.

Have you considered ice plant? It's very drought tolerant, does great in the full sun and makes great ground cover.

Thanks Heather and no I haven't. I always think of damp ocean breeze when I think of ice plant and not extremely dry hot weather. It grew like weeds along the coast where I used to live and I did enjoy it. I have not seen it actually growing around here, but have seen it being sold at Lowe's. I'll look it up to see what extremes it can take.

 

[JohnnyB65]

How about a grapevine? I have two grapevines in my Desert Tortoise enclosure and they provide a lot of shade plus food.

Thanks Carol, I tried to grow grapes many, many years ago for an arbor that I built and just could not get it to grow. I always thought it was because it was too hot or something.

 

[JohnnyB65]

I just looked up “ice Plant” and they sound like the perfect plant except that according to one web site they grow in zones 5-10. I believe I’m in Zone 18 and that depends on what zone map I look at, but its somewhere between 15 and 20 according to the USDA map for CA.

I also looked up grapes and found that Grapes grow in Zones 5-9

 

[Levi the Leopard]

I'm from SoCal. Chino Hills. My memories of ice plant are from the freeway on and off ramps LOL
You'll see ice plant all along the 60fwy especially as you drive through Ontario. It's in full sun, it's hot and it seems to do great.

I used ice plant in my Russian pens too. Again, in full sun and I had to trim it constantly!

 

[JohnnyB65]

Thanks Heather, I just got back from Lowe's and they had a sale on Aptenia Cordifolia. They said it does real well here and I only need to water it once a week after it takes hold. So I'm going to give it a try.

Here is a video of it growing wild without any watering for a couple of years.

 

[JohnnyB65]

I just finished planting the red apple ground cover (Aptenia cordifolia) and I just discovered that it is an Ice Plant. LOL

It is supposed to spread out 2ft which I’m hoping that it will cover everything. I want to buy a flat so that I could spread them out and have then fill in faster, but Home Depot only had one flat and it was on the ground under other outer plants. I think it was getting over watered because it wasn’t looking very well so I went to Lowe's and they only had 2.5-Quart sizes.

They don’t look very well after I planted them due to the heat and I hope they make it.

 

[Levi the Leopard]

You can temporarily put a shade cover over them. Just until they are more established.

It doesn't have to be fancy or look nice....just something for 2 weeks or so that will keep them shaded to lessen transplant shock.

 

[JohnnyB65]

Thanks, I just came in from misting them after the sun lowered and it cooled off some. They looked like were doing a little better. I guess I could put up a couple of beach umbrellas for now and I think I’ll mist them in the morning before going to work.