Hello, I'm brand new to Tortoises, and this forum has so far provided me with much more information than I hoped. Thank you for sharing all of your information!
I am temporarily housing a male RF, 9 inches long, and around 6 years old. We have had him for two days. His habitat has been in a 3" x 1.5" aquarium in a classroom. He is let out in the classroom in the morning (not with students) so he can roam for at least 1-2 hours. In the summer, the teacher takes him home and has built an outdoor enclosure that is much larger and meets his needs. This teacher feels bad and has asked me to take it as they can't put in the time needed to keep him happy and healthy.
Hopefully, we will be keeping him. We are still waiting for an answer from our landlord and from the original owner of the RF. Upon receiving him, we have read a lot and realized what poor conditions he has been in.
I am temporarily housing a male RF, 9 inches long, and around 6 years old. We have had him for two days. His habitat has been in a 3" x 1.5" aquarium in a classroom. He is let out in the classroom in the morning (not with students) so he can roam for at least 1-2 hours. In the summer, the teacher takes him home and has built an outdoor enclosure that is much larger and meets his needs. This teacher feels bad and has asked me to take it as they can't put in the time needed to keep him happy and healthy.
Hopefully, we will be keeping him. We are still waiting for an answer from our landlord and from the original owner of the RF. Upon receiving him, we have read a lot and realized what poor conditions he has been in.
- We have covered up the sides of his aquarium because he was constantly pushing against the glass.
- He had a CF UVB bulb, and we have ordered a tube one as we read that the CF can damage their eyes.
- We have also been working on increasing the humidity of his enclosure, and have been getting it closer to the recommended levels.
- We added a coconut husk plant liner that we flipped over for a hide, and added some bricks and covered them to create more diversity in the substrate. He has a mix of some sort of moss substrate, and cypress mulch.
- We also added a ceramic heating element (75 watt) but we may need a higher wattage. We figured we would start low until we could get a thermostat.
- Since we have gotten him, we noticed that he makes a whistling noise when he breathes. More often when he is moving around a lot. We are pretty sure it's because he has not had enough humidity, so we have been putting him in the bathtub with 1 1/2" of warm water (we ran the shower hot for 10 minutes prior to build humidity) and let him roam. His whistling has been getting better.
- Assuming we are able to keep him, we would like to build him a much larger enclosure. At least 6' x 4'. I have read differing information about whether or not the habitat should be enclosed. Is it possible to keep it open and still have enough humidity? Or have it partially closed? Any suggestions on building something to meet his needs would be greatly appreciated.
- In the meantime when we have him, we have only let him roam in the bathtub. I have read that it is dangerous to let him roam outside of his enclosure. However, he has been used to getting to do this his whole life. At this point, is it more important that we keep him in his tiny enclosure, or let him roam while highly monitored for a short time?
- We will need to take him to a vet. He has some white patches on his plastron that I believe to be a fungus. It doesn't really look like shell rot, but it is very possible based on his conditions. I could try to self treat, but I figure it would be better to get a vet's opinion. Are there any resources or well-known vets for tortoises in the Minneapolis area? Also, how do most tort owners transport their tortoises? In a cat carrier?