mylittlecholla
Active Member
I'm going to begin by venting, then I'll pose my question.
The background: People on the forum pointed out to me a few months ago that both the indoor and outdoor enclosures for my 3 year old desert tortoise were far too small for her. I was ashamed and distressed to hear it, and ever since then, I've been asking my son-in-law to build a night box for her. (Building Cholla's large permanent enclosure is not a problem for my husband and me, but building the night box is beyond our skill and tool sets.)
The venting: So our son-in-law cheerfully agreed to build the night box, and as of last week the work was supposed to be already underway, but for one reason or another, the work keeps getting stalled. Also the son-in-lawkeeps coming up with "better ideas" than those of the experienced tortoise keepers on this forum, and my daughter, loyal wife that she is, keeps backing hm up, saying, "Those people know a lot about tortoises but not necessarily about carpentry." The obvious response that you don't have to be a finish carpenter (as my son in law is) to build a good tortoise house; but you do need to know a lot about tortoises! Tom, for example, lives in our area, has been keeping tortoises for decades, and knows what they need in our climate. The young couple meets only the first criterion: they live in the SCV. They want to be helpful, but I don't want to be arguing with them every step of the way. End of vent.
The question: If in six weeks time we still have no proper night-box, I'd like to know whether there is anyone in Southern California whom we could pay to build a safe, secure, insulated, set-up for our Cholla per Tom's instructions?
The background: People on the forum pointed out to me a few months ago that both the indoor and outdoor enclosures for my 3 year old desert tortoise were far too small for her. I was ashamed and distressed to hear it, and ever since then, I've been asking my son-in-law to build a night box for her. (Building Cholla's large permanent enclosure is not a problem for my husband and me, but building the night box is beyond our skill and tool sets.)
The venting: So our son-in-law cheerfully agreed to build the night box, and as of last week the work was supposed to be already underway, but for one reason or another, the work keeps getting stalled. Also the son-in-lawkeeps coming up with "better ideas" than those of the experienced tortoise keepers on this forum, and my daughter, loyal wife that she is, keeps backing hm up, saying, "Those people know a lot about tortoises but not necessarily about carpentry." The obvious response that you don't have to be a finish carpenter (as my son in law is) to build a good tortoise house; but you do need to know a lot about tortoises! Tom, for example, lives in our area, has been keeping tortoises for decades, and knows what they need in our climate. The young couple meets only the first criterion: they live in the SCV. They want to be helpful, but I don't want to be arguing with them every step of the way. End of vent.
The question: If in six weeks time we still have no proper night-box, I'd like to know whether there is anyone in Southern California whom we could pay to build a safe, secure, insulated, set-up for our Cholla per Tom's instructions?