Hi everyone. It's starting to get nicer here (Idaho) and I was wondering what is a good temperature to take a russian tortoise outside for part of the day that isn't going to be too cold for them. I currently do not have an outdoor enclosure so I would be bringing him in at night but just want him to be able to have some good natural sunlight time until I do get the enclosure up and going. Any advice wanted!
How warm should it be before a Russian can go outside
- Thread starter cdb389
- Start date
There is no set answer for this. It depends on many factors. The position of your enclosure in relation to the sun. How warm the ground is in your enclosure. Whether its windy or partly cloudy.
Infrared temp guns are helpful in assessing these things. It will allow you to check the ground temps and your tortoises carapace temps. If its 60 or higher and sunny, and the ground is not damp or cold, and if its not windy, they will probably be okay. My tortoises like to bask along a south facing wall on cooler days. It is much warmer in the corner at the base of that wall than it is out in the open.
If its 68 outside, breezy, and cloudy with damp ground after a rain, it might be too cold.
Infrared temp guns are helpful in assessing these things. It will allow you to check the ground temps and your tortoises carapace temps. If its 60 or higher and sunny, and the ground is not damp or cold, and if its not windy, they will probably be okay. My tortoises like to bask along a south facing wall on cooler days. It is much warmer in the corner at the base of that wall than it is out in the open.
If its 68 outside, breezy, and cloudy with damp ground after a rain, it might be too cold.
A pretty good indicator that I use is if I can be outside without a jacket for more than 5 minutes without feeling uncomfortable. I live next door to you in Montana so we have similar climates. The ground is still pretty cold in our region so I would still want to wait until a couple weeks into May before I let her outside for more than a few minutes.
We live in the Pacific Northwest, and it is still pretty fresh here in the Spring. However, if the air temp is 60 degrees, this means the ground temp in the sunshine is much warmer (80 degrees!) if there is no wind. I probably look like an idiot walking around my yard in January with a temp gun looking for a warm spot... but this way I've been able to get the tortoises outside into natural sunlight for a few hours as early as Jan and Feb. The tortoise garden is still in the shade that time of year, but I have plastic kiddie pools that I put the torts in, and then I move the pool every 30 or so minutes as the sun moves. 
Like this…
Minnesota? That's east of the divide, right?
Here in the PNW, we've been getting what I refer to as, “bipolar" weather. We've lost some older, established plants from a late hard freeze after a stretch of warm weather fooled them into thinking it was springtime and they could bud out. Now, it's just nonstop rain.
Rain? I think I've heard of that before. I wonder what that's like?
Eltemp
Member
Here in mn my wife waits till the sun hits the deck when its over 60 and then puts them out until she was thinks its cooling off. They have made it out three afternoons so far this spring.
Similar threads
- Locked
