Would this be appropriate for a tortoise?

[Melissa101]

Hello everyone!

I’m looking at building an outdoor enclosure for my tortoise. I was initially thinking of a shed, but saw some people who have converted dog kennels for the purpose. I was hoping someone could look at the picture below & let me know if they think this would work?

Important info:
- my tortoise is a Greek Spur Thighed
- I live in the UK
- I would add further insulation
- I would attach his UV light & was thinking of including a heat mat as well (any recommendations here for heating would be appreciated!)
- I was going to add a sliding door which I could slide across at night or on colder days
- attached to this would be a large outdoor enclosure, securely fenced in
- dimensions of kennel are 116cm W, 79 D, 81cm H

Thanks everyone!

 

[Tom]

Modifying a dog house to work is more work and more expense than simply building a correctly designed and insulated house your self, and in the end, it never works well. I know this because I've been down this road soooooo many times. I wanted so badly to be able to simply find something that worked and buy it, rather than having to learn to build from scratch. After years of frustration, I can wholeheartedly recommend: Just bite the bullet and build your own.

Here is one example:

Single Tortoise Night Box

I like my larger tortoises to live outside full time. My climate permits this year round with a little help. For people who live where it snows all winter, this type of box is still good for warmer weather, getting them out earlier in Spring, and keeping them out a bit later into fall. You'll...

tortoiseforum.org

Contained in this thread is a better example, and how and why to heat it in your climate:

The Best Way To Raise Any Temperate Species Of Tortoise

I chose the title of this care sheet very carefully. Are there other ways to raise babies and care for adults? Yes. Yes there are, but those ways are not as good. What follows is the BEST way, according to 30 years of research and experimentation with hundreds of babies of many species. What is...

tortoiseforum.org

 

[PSLIMO]

Hi Melissa,

Tom has a good point at the end of the day the dog house after modifying it properly is just an outside shell.

But if you already have the dog house and like the looks, I converted the exact dog house and it works great holding temps. I replaced the flimsy slat bottom with plywood and then 1" foam boarded the inside, calked it air tight and then sandwiched 1/4" plywood over all. I made a simple hinged door with a sliding lock to cover the opening at night that doubles as a ramp to get out when it's open. For heat I used a Vivarium Electronics 120 watt radiant heat panel on a thermostat. You can buy the plastic slats for that house to cover the door when the ramps down during the day: https://www.chewy.com/precision-pet-products-outback-dog/dp/101999. The pic's below should explain what worked for me.

 

[Tom]

Hi Melissa,

Tom has a good point at the end of the day the dog house after modifying it properly is just an outside shell.

But if you already have the dog house and like the looks, I converted the exact dog house and it works great holding temps. I replaced the flimsy slat bottom with plywood and then 1" foam boarded the inside, calked it air tight and then sandwiched 1/4" plywood over all. I made a simple hinged door with a sliding lock to cover the opening at night that doubles as a ramp to get out when it's open. For heat I used a Vivarium Electronics 120 watt radiant heat panel on a thermostat. You can buy the plastic slats for that house to cover the door when the ramps down during the day: https://www.chewy.com/precision-pet-products-outback-dog/dp/101999. The pic's below should explain what worked for me.

View attachment 316843

View attachment 316844

Your work is so clean and straight and symmetrical! Beautiful.

Do you have pics with the plywood on the walls too?

Seems like if you covered at least the top half of that door, it would hold in heat much better too.

What did you do to stop heat loss on the top?

Is the 120 watt RHP able to maintain temps all by itself? Where in the world are you? @Melissa101 is in the UK, so I'm wondering if she'll need more heat than you do.

 

[PSLIMO]

Thanks Tom,

The RHP is attached to the top of the build and the removable roof has a piece of 1" foam board the fits inside the the side boards making it tightly insulated. I didn't run the plywood on the sides and opted to fiberglass the rest of the inside making it completely waterproof and tortoise scratch proof. I'm familiar with working with fiberglass but running plywood on the sides would be an easy alternative to someone that's not. Zoom in on this picture and you can see the first layer of glass on the bottom.



I'm in the Chicago area and I'd take a picture of the finished inside but we received 9" of blowing and drifting snow yesterday. My Leopard spends the winters in his indoor enclosure but his outdoor house is still plugged in. I use a wifi remote Govee unit to measure Temp/humidity remotely. Today it's in the 20's with 30 MPH winds and here's a live reading from inside his outdoor house:



Here's an older pic of his converted doghouse so you can see the trap door and plastic slats. That part of his outdoor enclosure is under a large deck and is out of the elements.



So converting a doghouse will work IMO but at the end of the day you have a tortoise house like you build with a cosmetic doghouse shell around it.