Hi everyone,
I've been reading through the forums the last couple weeks and this is going to be my first post. This post is to insure I'm hitting all the correct guidelines for proper Leopard tortoise care.
My fiance and I bought a Leopard tortoise from a reptile convention in Hamburg, PA on June 6th. His name is Yortoise. I'm not sure of his age or sex (we call 'him' he), but he's 2.75 inches long and weighs 74.7 grams.
We live in Gaithersburg, MD and plan to keep him indoors. We currently have him in a 15gallon long aquarium. I'm using cypress mulch as his substrate.
We feed him twice a day, once in the morning and once at night. His diet consists of mainly mustard greens and kale. About once a week we feed him a chopped banana. My fiance bought a cuttlebone from the local pet store thats suppose to provide him with some calcium (I don't think I've ever seen him notice it). I give him fresh dechlorinated water everyday and lately I've been giving him a quick bath in a shallow dish before I head out to work.
I've been playing around with different means of heating his tank to get the optimal tempature. Currently I'm using a UVB bulb which is placed overhead on the far right side of his tank. I keep it on from 8:00am until around 9:00pm (when we get home from work). I then switch it out for a Nightglow bulb. I also have a small heating pad placed on the backside of the tank which I keep on 24/7. Generally the tank runs around 85 degrees in the day and around 78 at night.
Twice a day I give his tank a good misting and I keep a small pile of peat moss damp at all times.
I have a couple concerns with my little Yortoise. First off, I've noticed he does this weird thing when he's laying still. The only way I can describe it is he's slowly swimming on land. His front legs and head sort of bob. He doesn't do it all the time but I notice him doing it at least once a day (usually more). I've tried researching it and couldn't find anything closely related.
Also, it might just me being paranoid but I feel like he should be eating more. Maybe he's just picky because he does seem to prefer the mustard greens over the kale.
Any insight you could give me would be greatly appreciated. My name is Ian by the way.
Thanks in advance =)
I've been reading through the forums the last couple weeks and this is going to be my first post. This post is to insure I'm hitting all the correct guidelines for proper Leopard tortoise care.
My fiance and I bought a Leopard tortoise from a reptile convention in Hamburg, PA on June 6th. His name is Yortoise. I'm not sure of his age or sex (we call 'him' he), but he's 2.75 inches long and weighs 74.7 grams.
We live in Gaithersburg, MD and plan to keep him indoors. We currently have him in a 15gallon long aquarium. I'm using cypress mulch as his substrate.
We feed him twice a day, once in the morning and once at night. His diet consists of mainly mustard greens and kale. About once a week we feed him a chopped banana. My fiance bought a cuttlebone from the local pet store thats suppose to provide him with some calcium (I don't think I've ever seen him notice it). I give him fresh dechlorinated water everyday and lately I've been giving him a quick bath in a shallow dish before I head out to work.
I've been playing around with different means of heating his tank to get the optimal tempature. Currently I'm using a UVB bulb which is placed overhead on the far right side of his tank. I keep it on from 8:00am until around 9:00pm (when we get home from work). I then switch it out for a Nightglow bulb. I also have a small heating pad placed on the backside of the tank which I keep on 24/7. Generally the tank runs around 85 degrees in the day and around 78 at night.
Twice a day I give his tank a good misting and I keep a small pile of peat moss damp at all times.
I have a couple concerns with my little Yortoise. First off, I've noticed he does this weird thing when he's laying still. The only way I can describe it is he's slowly swimming on land. His front legs and head sort of bob. He doesn't do it all the time but I notice him doing it at least once a day (usually more). I've tried researching it and couldn't find anything closely related.
Also, it might just me being paranoid but I feel like he should be eating more. Maybe he's just picky because he does seem to prefer the mustard greens over the kale.
Any insight you could give me would be greatly appreciated. My name is Ian by the way.
Thanks in advance =)