Chelle Duncan
New Member
- Joined
- Sep 23, 2014
- Messages
- 4
Hello, I am Michelle. My boyfriend, James and I are recent adopters of a female Sulcata tort, age unknown (probably around 5 yrs). Her name is Dandi. She is currently about the size of a "lady's footstool" and weights about 12 lbs. She had a rough start in life and has the long lasting scars to show for it. She suffers an overgrown lower beak, which she gets sedated and Dremeled a couple time/year. She also has some minor pyramiding in her scutes. We were lucky to be picked to adopt her. A very good friend of mine is a veterinarian who also has a great love and interest in many types of reptiles, and has agreed to help me with the special needs of Dandi. When she was rescued by the reptile sanctuary where we got her, she was malnourished and unable to eat due to her beak deformity. Dandi earned her name because when she was finally able to start eating and grazing, her favorite greens were dandelion leaves. She couldn't get enough of them, and still to this day will pass up everything else if dandelion is on the menu.
Since Dandi is still pretty small and portable, she is currently living in a 110 gallon stock tank on our sunporch. This gives her plenty of room to move around and turn around. During the day we take her out for several hours of sunlight and grazing in the yard. Since we are heading into fall and winter here in the mountains of NC, she will probably spend the next 6-7 months living on the sunporch. We are also building her an outdoor enclosure for next summer. An area 3 railroad ties x 3 railroad ties has been partitioned off for her on our 3.76 acre yard. She will still have run of the full yard to graze when we are home to supervise, but she will have a safe dry enclosure to roam when we have to be at work. We are busy dropping posts for the view obscuring fence, and I am trying to decipher the assembly instructions for a garden storage "shed" that will be her heated, night-time hangout.
I am still trying to find the best heating source for her. I have been trying ceramic heat emitters (CHEs), but am having a time getting the ambient temps warm enough. As a vet tech, I am always leary of putting any animal on a heating pad, but was thinking that maybe wrapping the walls of one end of her enclosure with a "pig blanket" or two might work to give her a nest of warmth. I also have some left over reflective insulation padding from building the outside shed. I am trying that with an old blanket, tented over the stock tank to hold heat inside the enclosure (no direct contact with lights or heating elements).
Feeding this girl has turned out to be the easy part. We sell duck eggs through a local organic market and they also provide us produce they can no longer put out to sell. This stuff looks good enough for me to eat, and it is all organic. They originally give it to us for the ducks, but there is plenty for Dandi, too. And as I mentioned earlier we have several acres for her to wander and graze.
I plan to be taking many, many pictures and posting them here and everywhere I can. I am a proud new Sulcata mom!!
Once Dandi outgrows her indoor enclosure, I hope to become the proud mom of a couple of Star Torts as well.
Since Dandi is still pretty small and portable, she is currently living in a 110 gallon stock tank on our sunporch. This gives her plenty of room to move around and turn around. During the day we take her out for several hours of sunlight and grazing in the yard. Since we are heading into fall and winter here in the mountains of NC, she will probably spend the next 6-7 months living on the sunporch. We are also building her an outdoor enclosure for next summer. An area 3 railroad ties x 3 railroad ties has been partitioned off for her on our 3.76 acre yard. She will still have run of the full yard to graze when we are home to supervise, but she will have a safe dry enclosure to roam when we have to be at work. We are busy dropping posts for the view obscuring fence, and I am trying to decipher the assembly instructions for a garden storage "shed" that will be her heated, night-time hangout.
I am still trying to find the best heating source for her. I have been trying ceramic heat emitters (CHEs), but am having a time getting the ambient temps warm enough. As a vet tech, I am always leary of putting any animal on a heating pad, but was thinking that maybe wrapping the walls of one end of her enclosure with a "pig blanket" or two might work to give her a nest of warmth. I also have some left over reflective insulation padding from building the outside shed. I am trying that with an old blanket, tented over the stock tank to hold heat inside the enclosure (no direct contact with lights or heating elements).
Feeding this girl has turned out to be the easy part. We sell duck eggs through a local organic market and they also provide us produce they can no longer put out to sell. This stuff looks good enough for me to eat, and it is all organic. They originally give it to us for the ducks, but there is plenty for Dandi, too. And as I mentioned earlier we have several acres for her to wander and graze.
I plan to be taking many, many pictures and posting them here and everywhere I can. I am a proud new Sulcata mom!!
Once Dandi outgrows her indoor enclosure, I hope to become the proud mom of a couple of Star Torts as well.