Enclosure advice - RFT and Tortoise House

ExtremeJustin

New Member
5 Year Member
Joined
Mar 16, 2011
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5
Location (City and/or State)
Tampa, Florida
Hi. I introduced myself and then promptly disappeared about 5 years ago or so. I have a Red Foot that is now 6 and plenty big enough to be outdoors. I promised myself last year that the tort would be out in the early Spring and never did it due to a combination of health problems and a lack of drive to do much of anything (which I'm thinking now might be a symptom of the health problem). I live in Tampa, Florida so the non-winter temps are perfect outside. The humidity is perfect outside too. My problem is this: I'm not skilled with woodwork and don't have the tools. I'm thinking about putting up a dog fence and using a border on the bottom so he doesn't get stuck in the fence and also so he doesn't get any escape ideas. Currently I'm using a Zoo Med Tortoise House inside. It has a hide area that is 1ft x 2 ft and a screen area that it is 2ft x 2ft. I know that 2 of these can be connected together to make it 2 ft x 4ft with two 1ft x 2ft hide areas. It's right around a foot tall. My question is this: would that even be enough room for one RFT later on? How tall do I need to plan for the enclosures to be. I'm thinking about setting up one another Zoo Med Tortoise House or 2 outside for now so that I can get the tort outside. My plan is to put it out on the East side of the house because it faces the neighbors yard and can't be seen from the street. (I don't have to worry about indoor theft here, but we have idiots that will steal things outside. Someone once stole marker poles that cost around 2 dollars a piece. The reason I'm wanting the top covered is that we do have birds of prey here. There's at least one hawk that comes around looking for small animals. We once had neighbors that had a small pig. One day we never saw that pig again. And it was way too small for anyone to have gone through the effort of killing and cooking it. Am I being paranoid? Can I just get some kind of fence and let them be in it? Do I really need a covering? I'm def going to get a security cam. I may just keep him indoors in the winter. I haven't figured that out yet. Sorry to bombard everything with this at once. It's just that this has become a priority for me to get done because I will be undergoing a major surgery soon, and I want everything in place and working before that happens--especially in the event that something happens to me. BTW, the tortoise is now more than 6 inches. I'll have to post pics soon.

Justin
 

Yvonne G

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Jan 23, 2008
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Clovis, CA
I've used the dog fence for temporary quarantine pens. With a wood border it would work fine. Or cinderblocks. They're easy to move around and quite escape proof. With a RF you probably only need to stack them two high. If you use either your house or fence for one wall then you can build the other three walls with cinderblocks.

IMG_1877.jpg

(picture off the internet)
 

Yvonne G

Old Timer
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10 Year Member!
Platinum Tortoise Club
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Jan 23, 2008
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Clovis, CA
Nope. Just stack them up.
 

Jennifer M

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5 Year Member
Joined
Nov 25, 2016
Messages
134
Location (City and/or State)
South Georgia
Here's mine with cinder blocks. This is the enclosure we've started for when our redfoot gets older and big enough. It's a work in progress. Still need to add shade spots and a pool. Plants and weeds are sprouting now.
 

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