Hi,
We have recently brought Lemmy home to join our family. He is around 2 and has fascinated all of us!
As noted in other posts, the advice online, and from the pet shop is very contradictory.
Our set up is a Prorep vivarium with mesh on the sides, temperature under the light at shell height is a steady 36 and at the far end around 22. We have his fresh water in place and are trying to get on top of his diet as the advice from the pet shop didn’t match what we found online. Starting tomorrow I’ll be raiding the garden with this website open!
I’m really looking for any general advice, as Lemmy will probably outlive myself and my wife we want to give him the best start in life possible. We live in Scotland so will be looking to set up an outdoor area for the couple days of summer we have. We wanted an enclosed vivarium for Lemmy as we have a dog and wanted to ensure that escapes were almost impossible so there would be no disasters! Any tips on what works well for others would be very much appreciated.
New Hermanns Owner - any general advice welcome!
New Hermanns Owner - any general advice welcome!
- Attachments
-
Re: New Hermanns Owner - any general advice welcome!
Hi Pete.
Here is a Hermann caresheet for you to be reading until me or Nina get back and one of us will answer more thoroughly. He is a beautiful tortoise and if you could send in another photo of the whole enclosure it will allow us to give answers. How did you get to the temperature you stated.
What thermometer, and anything else you can offer that might help is.
https://www.tortoise-protection-group.o ... 014New.pdf
Lin
Here is a Hermann caresheet for you to be reading until me or Nina get back and one of us will answer more thoroughly. He is a beautiful tortoise and if you could send in another photo of the whole enclosure it will allow us to give answers. How did you get to the temperature you stated.
What thermometer, and anything else you can offer that might help is.
https://www.tortoise-protection-group.o ... 014New.pdf
Lin
Re: New Hermanns Owner - any general advice welcome!
Hi Pete, and welcome to The Tortoise Table -- and congratulations on welcoming Lemmy into your home.
First of all, here is a link to a care sheet for Hermanns tortoises: https://www.tortoise-protection-group.o ... 014New.pdf and I hope it's of some use to you.
I'm not familiar with those ProRep vivs with mesh. I've tried looking them up and can only see ones that are glass or acrylic, and the photo you sent seems to have glass or acrylic walls too. How much of the walls are made of mesh? If most of the walls are made of mesh then that is a great deal better than the classic vivarium, because the mesh will allow better ventilation and a better temperature gradient. Glass/acrylic traditional aquariums are definitely not recommended for tortoises (they are good for snakes and lizards but not for tortoises and I can explain why if you are interested), but if the sides are all mesh then that eliminates one of the main risks of vivariums for tortoises.
Regarding the temperature you are getting, I'm afraid 36C is too hot, especially for a small tortoise, as it puts him in danger of dehydrating quickly. If the air temperature is 36C, can you also measure the temperature of the substrate underneath the basking lamp? What you should be aiming for is about 30C under the light and about 20C at the cool end, so if you can raise your light up higher (i.e. further away from the floor of the viv) then the temperature will go down. If you can't raise the light then maybe a smaller watt bulb can be substituted.
It's really important to be able to raise and lower the bulb because as the temperature of the room that the enclosure is in gets warmer or cooler, so does the temperature in the tortoise enclosure, so if you could give some more details about your set-up, maybe we could suggest a few tweaks. You are absolutely right to want to protect your tortoise from your dog, but if necessary, could you take the top off the viv and put some chicken wire or something to cover it to protect it from your dog, but still letting the light and heat from the bulb get through?
It's great that you have a soil based substrate, and Lemmy will like that. Because it's so warm in his viv, it's even more important that you bathe him every day or two, in warm water that comes just up to his chin, and in a container that he can't see out of (like an old washing up bowl). Many tortoises won't drink from their water bowl (I have one tortoise that does and one that doesn't), and these soaks will keep him well hydrated.
The only other little thing I might suggest would be to tape some cardboard up around the outside of the base of the viv, just high enough so that Lemmy can't see out. Tortoises don't understand the concept of glass, and if they can see through it then they want to get through it, which they find very frustrating, so blocking their view out is actually a kindness.
That is great that you're building him an outdoor enclosure -- he will love it. I find that if sun is out (as it was today here in Oxford), you can put him out for quite a while, and just keep feeling his shell and when it starts to feel cool then bring him in for a warm up.
Please feel free to ask any questions about diet. You can also use the filter tool to produce list of edible plants for Lemmy. Just go to this page https://www.thetortoisetable.org.uk/pla ... -database/ and scroll down to the section called 'How to Use the Traffic Light Filters', and if you have any problems or question about how to use it, just let us know. If a plant isn't in our database, do write to us either here or at contact@thetortoisetable.org.uk and ask us about it, and we'll research the plant and get back to you a.s.a.p.
Sorry for such a long post! I do think Lemmy is a very handsome chappy and it's so nice to know that he has found a home with a family that obviously have already fallen in love with him!
Oops, I've just seen that while I was writing this, Lin has also posted, so apologies if we said some of the same things!
Nina
First of all, here is a link to a care sheet for Hermanns tortoises: https://www.tortoise-protection-group.o ... 014New.pdf and I hope it's of some use to you.
I'm not familiar with those ProRep vivs with mesh. I've tried looking them up and can only see ones that are glass or acrylic, and the photo you sent seems to have glass or acrylic walls too. How much of the walls are made of mesh? If most of the walls are made of mesh then that is a great deal better than the classic vivarium, because the mesh will allow better ventilation and a better temperature gradient. Glass/acrylic traditional aquariums are definitely not recommended for tortoises (they are good for snakes and lizards but not for tortoises and I can explain why if you are interested), but if the sides are all mesh then that eliminates one of the main risks of vivariums for tortoises.
Regarding the temperature you are getting, I'm afraid 36C is too hot, especially for a small tortoise, as it puts him in danger of dehydrating quickly. If the air temperature is 36C, can you also measure the temperature of the substrate underneath the basking lamp? What you should be aiming for is about 30C under the light and about 20C at the cool end, so if you can raise your light up higher (i.e. further away from the floor of the viv) then the temperature will go down. If you can't raise the light then maybe a smaller watt bulb can be substituted.
It's really important to be able to raise and lower the bulb because as the temperature of the room that the enclosure is in gets warmer or cooler, so does the temperature in the tortoise enclosure, so if you could give some more details about your set-up, maybe we could suggest a few tweaks. You are absolutely right to want to protect your tortoise from your dog, but if necessary, could you take the top off the viv and put some chicken wire or something to cover it to protect it from your dog, but still letting the light and heat from the bulb get through?
It's great that you have a soil based substrate, and Lemmy will like that. Because it's so warm in his viv, it's even more important that you bathe him every day or two, in warm water that comes just up to his chin, and in a container that he can't see out of (like an old washing up bowl). Many tortoises won't drink from their water bowl (I have one tortoise that does and one that doesn't), and these soaks will keep him well hydrated.
The only other little thing I might suggest would be to tape some cardboard up around the outside of the base of the viv, just high enough so that Lemmy can't see out. Tortoises don't understand the concept of glass, and if they can see through it then they want to get through it, which they find very frustrating, so blocking their view out is actually a kindness.
That is great that you're building him an outdoor enclosure -- he will love it. I find that if sun is out (as it was today here in Oxford), you can put him out for quite a while, and just keep feeling his shell and when it starts to feel cool then bring him in for a warm up.
Please feel free to ask any questions about diet. You can also use the filter tool to produce list of edible plants for Lemmy. Just go to this page https://www.thetortoisetable.org.uk/pla ... -database/ and scroll down to the section called 'How to Use the Traffic Light Filters', and if you have any problems or question about how to use it, just let us know. If a plant isn't in our database, do write to us either here or at contact@thetortoisetable.org.uk and ask us about it, and we'll research the plant and get back to you a.s.a.p.
Sorry for such a long post! I do think Lemmy is a very handsome chappy and it's so nice to know that he has found a home with a family that obviously have already fallen in love with him!
Oops, I've just seen that while I was writing this, Lin has also posted, so apologies if we said some of the same things!
Nina
Re: New Hermanns Owner - any general advice welcome!
Thanks for all the advice! There’s so much learning to do so we want to get into good habits early.
I’ve attached a photo of Lemmy’s viv, my last post didn’t describe it well (kids climbing on me at the time!) there are small mesh parts on the side and the top is completely mesh.
To measure the temperature we have used an infrared thermometer for measuring a person’s temperature. I was fairly sure it would give us a good measure of surface temperature, however from playing around with it a bit I don’t think it’s suitable to get an accurate measure in Lemmy’s home. Can you guys suggest a better solution for thermometers? We were supplied one which sticks on the side of his home but I know from what I’ve read they aren’t really to be trusted. We have it at the cool side and it reads a pretty steady 22 to 23 degrees with humidity at 50% just now, humidity has slowly been falling since we set it all up.
I’ve attached a photo of Lemmy’s viv, my last post didn’t describe it well (kids climbing on me at the time!) there are small mesh parts on the side and the top is completely mesh.
To measure the temperature we have used an infrared thermometer for measuring a person’s temperature. I was fairly sure it would give us a good measure of surface temperature, however from playing around with it a bit I don’t think it’s suitable to get an accurate measure in Lemmy’s home. Can you guys suggest a better solution for thermometers? We were supplied one which sticks on the side of his home but I know from what I’ve read they aren’t really to be trusted. We have it at the cool side and it reads a pretty steady 22 to 23 degrees with humidity at 50% just now, humidity has slowly been falling since we set it all up.
- Attachments
-
Who is online
Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 6 guests