Working on a Pancake Tortoise care sheet. Anyone want to contribute their own commentary on their personal experience as well?
For the pooping in their water thing I just moved my water bowl a bit farther away and turned it (mine is rectangle shaped, not round) so that there is a nice sized gap in between the food and water bowls. This has greatly fixed the daily poop in the water. Now it's just when they want to soak that I find poop.Sure.
For adults lets look at some simple quantitative stuff.
1.1 tortoises should have at least 4 square feet of cage foot print. This is multiplied for floor space by having multiple hides made of flat stones or tile. So one 2 x 2 enclosure (4 square feet) with a 1 x 2 (two more square feet of walk-able space) tile would effectively have six square feet of floor space.
There should be hides times the number of tortoises plus one. So two tortoises should have three hides. Six tortoises should have seven hides.
Each additional tortoise to a colony should have an additional square foot of foot print and square foot of walk-able space.
I have colonies of 1.2 and 1.3. All of the enclosures are 2 x 4 with one or two tiles that are 1 x 1 or 1 x 2, and sweater boxes that sit on the enclosure floor or the tile.
They will drink and sit in the water and poop. Multiple water dishes do not mean longer periods with a dish that does not get pooped in. I don't have a dish solution. Sometimes I have used chicken water dishes that have a circle filled with a gravity fill screwed into the center. They still find a way to hang their south end over the ring and poop in it. I just make sure to change the water every other day or so. They seem to like pooping in their water or as they eat.
They seem to be broad-leaf eaters more so than grass.
Colonies with one male and multiple females consistently work without aggression. But males seem to need to get their testosterone hooped up with some combat. Place two males together in an enclosure with no females. While supervised let them have some combat. Put each males back in it's home enclosure, they both think they won (the other males is not around) and they have a party with the females.
I eagerly await others' contributions. If you just agree with me you aren't permitted to contribute at all (LOL). " And that's the truth" RuthAnn.
Because that is my Blue Eyed Leucistic snake Celestite.Why is ur avatar a snake
I'll take some more enclosure pictures. I have a really nice one at home for indoor and outdoor, but more pictures is great.If you need any pictures of pancake tortoises for your care sheet please ask, such as enclosure pictures, good hides...