Hi

[murdoch55]

Hi everyone
Merry Christmas from Alberta
I just found my way here so thought I should check in.

I have had a Russion tort for about 3 weeks now named Boris. He is abour 3.5 inches long and was 170 grams 10 days ago . He has had a great vet check and stool check.The store I got him from said he was about 5 months old but I am not sure on this so if anyone is able to give me a way to determine age LMK.

He is amazing! I got him to be a classroom pet and he is soo spoiled imagine having 20 plus kids checking on your every need ( they r funny he has a food list and they will only let him have certified organic and no "Junk" food). He has a 4 x4 by 14 inch deep tort table with 2 hot spots and a 24 inch uvb strip and multiple edible live plants and about 4 inchs of substrate plus hides. I think this is ok for indoor? Once it warms up he will have a 10 by 20 outdoor safe cage to use at school and 4 acres when i gring him home ( oh his weekend home here is 3 by2.5 with all the same amenities as school , I call it his cabin).
Anyway i would love to add a couple females to this in the next year or so and would love any and all advice so please speak up.

thanks all
Ian

 

[Yvonne G]

Hi Ian:

Welcome to the Tortoise Forum!!

 

[dmarcus]

Hello and welcome to the forum...

 

[Yash Raj]

Welcome.

 

[Zamric]

Welcome to the Forum

 

[Floof]

Welcome to the forum!

Russians are one of my favorite species, I just love their attitudes--always marching around the enclosure, so confident and out-going. Wonderful torts!

The main piece of advice I'd like to impart, if you choose to get a few females, is that you'll need a larger enclosure if you do it--both for at school, and for at home. And deeper... You'll want a deep enough substrate that they can lay eggs (should you be successful on the breeding front), meaning 8-10", plus enough height left over on the enclosure that they can't "stack" and climb out! There's certainly nothing wrong with turning your lone male into a breeding group, I'm sure your students would go nuts, but keep in mind that doing so means you'll need to build an entirely new enclosure, say twice the size of what you have now (8x4 ft).

The other thing is your UVB: Try switching to a PowerSun bulb, or a similar, high-quality MVB. It's a much higher quality UVB source: Overall stronger UVB output, puts out UVB for longer (around a year rather than the maybe 6 months you get out of a fluorescent), and has the extra bonus of putting out heat, too--so you can use it as one of your basking spots, and completely eliminate the extra light fixture.

That's about all I have to say! Other than, I wish any of my teachers growing up had been cool enough to have a class pet reptile... (Not to mention awesome enough to care for it correctly!!! I half-expected you to say he was in a 20 gallon tank or something equally heinous when you said "classroom pet"... Heh) Again, welcome to the forum! Happy to have you.

 

[ALDABRAMAN]

Welcome.

 

[ascott]

Welcome to the Forum We LOVE PICS

From what you have described, all sounds aok

 

[Melly-n-shorty]

Welcom Ian and Boris!

 

[murdoch55]

Thanks everyone
I should mention I had to go with 2nd best on the UV light at school for a few weeks until I have more funds available...Torts in Canada are crazy prices ( 500$ for this one) because they cannot be imported at all. So just getting him set up in a reasonable manner has cost a bit over 1000 so far...He does have a reptisun Cf light at home and i will add another Uv light at school next month at the same time as I add a 2nd level to his tort table. I believe very strongly in giving as complicated an environment as possible to all my pets so this one will evololve continually.

One question on substrate. Is potting soil (cleab sterile and only soil) ok to use ? So far I have only used coconut coir in a few different forms to make substrate.

 

[Floof]

On the UVB, DO NOT use the the coil bulbs! They may look like a good idea, but they're notorious for damaging tortoises' eyes. Honestly, you'd be better off turning the coil bulb off and only having the basking light on during the day until you can get something better. The straight tube-style ReptiSun 10.0 is pretty decent, arguably the best of the fluorescent UVB bulbs, and at least won't damage your tort's eyes, but definitely don't use the coil bulbs.

BTW, you can get the MVBs online for as low as $40 plus shipping, if it helps. I've gotten my bulbs from The Bean Farm in the past, at $42 each (tons better than the $70 or so you can expect to pay at a pet store here in the states), and I believe one of TFO's members sells them at $40 each--I just can't remember who it was.

On the soil, yes, clean "Topsoil" and super-plain potting soil (make sure there's not even Perlite--that's the little white pebble-looking things--as tortoises often think they're edible!) are OK to use. Right now, for my Russians, my substrate is a mix of Coconut coir, a tiny bit of sand, and the better part of a big bag of plain sphagnum peat moss (the soil-type product, not the actual, long-fibered moss product). This mix has worked out very well for me. The peat moss would have been too clumpy and heavy by itself, and the coir always dried out too quickly, but mixing the two together seems to have fixed both problems. (I'm a month or so into using this mix, and have only had to dump water in and re-moisten once or twice, as opposed to every couple days with plain coir.)

 

[pdrobber]

welcome