I have been mulling this problem over for a long time now. The days here are plenty warm for a russian for most of the year. I hibernate them in winter, so they are fast asleep for the vast majority of the cooler days anyway. My problem is that we have cold nights here. Even with days in the 80s, night temps drop into the low 40's or high 30's in spring and fall. What I have been doing is collecting up all 20 russians, putting them outside once the day warms up and then hunting them all up every evening and bringing them back to their indoor enclosures for night time. This is a pain in the rear and very time consuming. Time is something I am in short supply of.
So I came up with this:
The box is too small and too low for a CHE or heat bulb, and I don't want it hot in there anyway. This is an 80 watt radiant heat panel http://www.reptilebasics.com/80-watt-radiant-heat-panel controlled by a Zilla thermostat. I mounted it all to the hinged lid on my semi-buried russian night box. Seen here: http://www.tortoiseforum.org/threads/semi-underground-russian-box.98590/ The lid opens and closes and the cords are tucked out of the way and fastened in place so the tortoises can't reach them and they can't fall down. I will be watching the temps in there for a few days before trying it out on the torties.
The goal is to keep the night temps no lower than 65ish so they can just stay outside full time all year long (except when they are hibernating for 10-12 weeks in winter), and all I have to do is make sure they are all in the boxes every evening. Last summer it only took a few days to get them all using the night box every night.
I'll keep you posted on the results.
So I came up with this:
The box is too small and too low for a CHE or heat bulb, and I don't want it hot in there anyway. This is an 80 watt radiant heat panel http://www.reptilebasics.com/80-watt-radiant-heat-panel controlled by a Zilla thermostat. I mounted it all to the hinged lid on my semi-buried russian night box. Seen here: http://www.tortoiseforum.org/threads/semi-underground-russian-box.98590/ The lid opens and closes and the cords are tucked out of the way and fastened in place so the tortoises can't reach them and they can't fall down. I will be watching the temps in there for a few days before trying it out on the torties.
The goal is to keep the night temps no lower than 65ish so they can just stay outside full time all year long (except when they are hibernating for 10-12 weeks in winter), and all I have to do is make sure they are all in the boxes every evening. Last summer it only took a few days to get them all using the night box every night.
I'll keep you posted on the results.