Orlaith
New Member
Hi everyone,
I live in Ireland with my tortoise Herbie. I've had him for 8 years and a couple of months ago I discovered this forum and I've since used the information available to try and improve his life. He was previously living in a plastic storage box with a substrate of reptile sand and Aspen snake bedding and a uv tube bulb. He now has a wooden 6ft x 4ft tortoise table built with the help of my dad. The substrate is eco Earth (Coco coir?). For lighting he has his uv bulb (24" 18 watt) and I also purchased a heat lamp for him with a 150 watt exo Terra intense basking spot bulb. The temperatures are as follows: hot end = 85-90, cool end = 70-75, basking spot = 96 - 105. Diet consisted mainly of dandelion weeds from the garden, some lambs lettuce sometimes, kale and he was having broccoli for awhile until I discovered that it can affect calcium absorption. Now I have some salad mix which has radicchio, frisee, lollo Rosso and escarole lettuce, he also gets some zoo med grassland tortoise food, dandelion (flowers +weeds) and kale.
I moved him into the tortoise table on the 22nd Feb this year, since then I have found that he just wants to sleep all the time. I was leaving food out for him before I went to work so he could eat during the day when I wasn't there but then I noticed that the food was not being touched and I never saw him in the evenings either so I concluded that he wasn't actually waking up at all. So then I started waking him in the mornings to try and persuade him to eat and he still wasn't eating and then I started hand feeding him and then he would eat for me, mainly dandelion weeds, bits of kale and once he ate the zoo med food.
I read that their beaks can get overgrown and Herbie had been eating off a plastic plate the last 8 years so I booked an appointment with the nearest exotics vet. She thought that maybe the reason he wasn't eating was because of calcium and she also attributed the overgrown beak to lack of calcium, back in September/October when reading on this forum I saw that leaving a cuttlefish bone available could be used for calcium so I left that for him but I'm not sure that he ever had any of it, previously I had given him calcium powder. So the vet trimmed his beak, suggested using calcium powder again and I bought some off her. She also thought that I needed a heat source at night and suggested I get a heat mat. She also thought my temperatures at the hot end were a bit too cold but that the heat mat might boost them up a bit and to adjust the heat lamp a bit more to get hotter temperatures. She also suggested that until he was a bit healthier to give him a 10 minute soak each day. And she thought he might be a girl? I took her advice and made the suggested changes.
It has only been a week since the vet appointment but I just thought I'd ask for a few opinions on here as well, just because I've been worrying about him. For a few days he would eat the radicchio on his own and the dandelion flowers but they were the only parts of the food he would eat. But then on Tuesday he didn't eat anything again so yesterday I woke him and put a dandelion + calcium powder under his heat lamp (there are loads of dandelions around here at the moment) and he ate that so I just kept giving them to him to see how many he'd eat and he ate about 10 of them and then went back to sleep. I've also started soaking him under his uv bulb because he's been sleeping so much I don't think he could possibly be getting enough uvb and after his soaks he is usually fairly active, and often eats (not since Tuesday). His daily pattern has been me waking him up, soaking him under his uv, putting him under his basking spot to dry off and then he may or may not eat and then straight away he goes into his hide or buries himself. Is it too dark for him in the tortoise table? Not warm enough? Is he sick? I am welcome to any suggestions for improvements for my little guy. See attached photos of setup and of Herbie himself, all plants are fake and the black stuff around my tortoise table is just pond liner. Thanks in advance.
I live in Ireland with my tortoise Herbie. I've had him for 8 years and a couple of months ago I discovered this forum and I've since used the information available to try and improve his life. He was previously living in a plastic storage box with a substrate of reptile sand and Aspen snake bedding and a uv tube bulb. He now has a wooden 6ft x 4ft tortoise table built with the help of my dad. The substrate is eco Earth (Coco coir?). For lighting he has his uv bulb (24" 18 watt) and I also purchased a heat lamp for him with a 150 watt exo Terra intense basking spot bulb. The temperatures are as follows: hot end = 85-90, cool end = 70-75, basking spot = 96 - 105. Diet consisted mainly of dandelion weeds from the garden, some lambs lettuce sometimes, kale and he was having broccoli for awhile until I discovered that it can affect calcium absorption. Now I have some salad mix which has radicchio, frisee, lollo Rosso and escarole lettuce, he also gets some zoo med grassland tortoise food, dandelion (flowers +weeds) and kale.
I moved him into the tortoise table on the 22nd Feb this year, since then I have found that he just wants to sleep all the time. I was leaving food out for him before I went to work so he could eat during the day when I wasn't there but then I noticed that the food was not being touched and I never saw him in the evenings either so I concluded that he wasn't actually waking up at all. So then I started waking him in the mornings to try and persuade him to eat and he still wasn't eating and then I started hand feeding him and then he would eat for me, mainly dandelion weeds, bits of kale and once he ate the zoo med food.
I read that their beaks can get overgrown and Herbie had been eating off a plastic plate the last 8 years so I booked an appointment with the nearest exotics vet. She thought that maybe the reason he wasn't eating was because of calcium and she also attributed the overgrown beak to lack of calcium, back in September/October when reading on this forum I saw that leaving a cuttlefish bone available could be used for calcium so I left that for him but I'm not sure that he ever had any of it, previously I had given him calcium powder. So the vet trimmed his beak, suggested using calcium powder again and I bought some off her. She also thought that I needed a heat source at night and suggested I get a heat mat. She also thought my temperatures at the hot end were a bit too cold but that the heat mat might boost them up a bit and to adjust the heat lamp a bit more to get hotter temperatures. She also suggested that until he was a bit healthier to give him a 10 minute soak each day. And she thought he might be a girl? I took her advice and made the suggested changes.
It has only been a week since the vet appointment but I just thought I'd ask for a few opinions on here as well, just because I've been worrying about him. For a few days he would eat the radicchio on his own and the dandelion flowers but they were the only parts of the food he would eat. But then on Tuesday he didn't eat anything again so yesterday I woke him and put a dandelion + calcium powder under his heat lamp (there are loads of dandelions around here at the moment) and he ate that so I just kept giving them to him to see how many he'd eat and he ate about 10 of them and then went back to sleep. I've also started soaking him under his uv bulb because he's been sleeping so much I don't think he could possibly be getting enough uvb and after his soaks he is usually fairly active, and often eats (not since Tuesday). His daily pattern has been me waking him up, soaking him under his uv, putting him under his basking spot to dry off and then he may or may not eat and then straight away he goes into his hide or buries himself. Is it too dark for him in the tortoise table? Not warm enough? Is he sick? I am welcome to any suggestions for improvements for my little guy. See attached photos of setup and of Herbie himself, all plants are fake and the black stuff around my tortoise table is just pond liner. Thanks in advance.