Redfoot for School

[Jennifer M]

Hi All! We are looking for a Redfoot for our school. We have started an initiative to include animals within our school day. We have already hatched and are raising our own chickens. Now we want to add a tortoise. I personally have my own Redfoot that I've raised from a baby and she is 6 years old now. So I'm on the search for a Redfoot. Unfortunately we don't have a huge budget to buy one do I'm looking for a discounted one or even a donation. Please let me know if you can help.

 

[Alex and the Redfoot]

Hello!
I'm a bit concerned, that with limited budget it is possible to raise a healthy redfoot. They need large enclosures with high humidity and stable temperatures (and a nice outdoors space). Maybe a temperate specie would be easier to maintain.

Anyway, you can look at animal rescues nearby and adopt a tortoise from there. I doubt that a responsible breeder will agree to give away a hatchling for school (and it's not the financial matters).

 

[Jennifer M]

Hello!
I'm a bit concerned, that with limited budget it is possible to raise a healthy redfoot. They need large enclosures with high humidity and stable temperatures (and a nice outdoors space). Maybe a temperate specie would be easier to maintain.

Anyway, you can look at animal rescues nearby and adopt a tortoise from there. I doubt that a responsible breeder will agree to give away a hatchling for school (and it's not the financial matters).

Thanks for your response! We have a plan for the outdoor enclosure already that will not cost us much. I have cinder blocks from my old tortoise enclosure because I redid my girl's enclosure. So we are moving the cinder blocks from my house to the school. We also have a parent who does construction that has offered to build us a heated night box for winter. She will stay inside our classrooms for a while though while she's smaller.

 

[SinLA]

As someone who works in schools, I can only say - please do not do this.

All that ends up getting taught to entire generations of kids is bad pet care. Teachers always mean well, and they pass along the (usually outdated/bad) knowledge they learned as kids, or even as owners, but in the end, schools almost never make healthy conditions for reptiles, and the prioritization of "its fun for kids" always trumps the best interest of the animals. ESPECIALLY ones that will long outlive the interest/ability for the one teacher who cares about it to stay attached to it. Teachers leave the profession (in droves), or they move schools where they can't take it with them, or they retire, and then the poor thing just ends up not being cared for and living an even more miserable life than the one they already had with too small/inappropriate setups even when they had a teacher who cared. And then tons of students "remember we had one in class" and take that knowledge and go out and get one and keep it poorly. Rinse and repeat for years and decades.

The BEST thing schools can do is have an expert bring an "animal ambassador" in for the short attention span that kids really care, rather than years and years of miserable lives.

I know you mean well, and I'm sure your own are kept well, but schools are not appropriate places for pets and they don't actually teach children well about them. Its a lose-lose for everyone involved, but especially the animal.

 

[ZEROPILOT]

Any time I see or hear the words TORTOISE or TURTLE and SCHOOL used together in the same sentence, I get a chill down my spine.
I absolutely hate the idea.
However, the OP is a skilled and experienced keeper and asks the right questions.
As long as the tortoise has a correctly set up enclosure 24/7 and as limited access to kids as is possible, I say keep us posted

 

[Jennifer M]

And I will say if I ever leave or change schools, she will come with me. I will not leave her to anyone else.