Housing your tortoise

Tortoises need either a vivarium or a tortoise table to live in. It is best to get the house and furnishings from a specialist reptile shop. Vivariums made of glass or plastic are a good idea as these materials are easy to clean.

A glass or plastic vivarium is ideal; within the vivarium you should try to create a world which mimics the environment your species of tortoise would live in if they were living in the wild. This will allow your tortoise to express natural behaviors as they would in the wild. Therefore, it is very important that you fully research your chosen species so that you can create the correct living environment.

Tortoise tables tend to be made of wood and are a large open topped rectangular box. The sides have to be high enough to prevent escape.

It is also important to think about where you will place your tortoise’s house in your own home. The best place to put it is in a room that is used regularly, like your bedroom or the main living room, not an unused room which could become too cold. Your tortoise needs to be somewhere with a constant temperature. Do not put his house beside a window or over a radiator as the temperature will rise and fall too much in these areas.

Substrate is the material used to cover the floor of your tortoise’s house. If you have a desert species you should provide him with sand. A tropical species on the other hand needs a combination of soil and moss. Be aware your tortoise may try to ingest this substrate that can cause impaction which can be serious.

You will also need to put some furniture in the house. Your tortoise needs to have somewhere to hide, especially if the house is in a busy room. You can buy a plastic cave or you can use pieces of wood or small logs to make an artificial but more natural looking hide. Hay makes good nest material, but care must be taken to prevent strands wrapping around his legs causing pain or damage to the skin.

Life on Earth is supported by the sun. The sun provides heat and also light. Animals need both heat and light to survive. Mammals can control their own body temperature. The food they eat provides the body with energy and heat. If they are too cold they shiver and if they are too hot they sweat. These processes use a lot of energy.

Your tortoise is a reptile and reptiles regulate their body temperature very differently from mammals. This is a major and vitally important difference. Tortoises are cold blooded (ectothermic). This means that their bodies cannot produce heat from the food that they eat. Because of this they need much less energy from food to survive. A 100 g tortoise needs only 5% of the energy that a 100 g mammal needs. To keep warm they need to bathe in the sun or sit on a warm rock. You should provide a basking area for your tortoise which is in the ‘warm end’ of the vivarium. They have no hair, no sweat glands and do not shiver. This means that your tortoise will show no obvious signs that they are too hot or too cold. You may see your tortoise become less mobile if cold so it’s important to learn your tortoise’s normal activity level.

You need to provide sources of heat for your tortoise within his house. This could be a heat bulb, a ceramic bulb or an under-floor heating mat. It is important that you know the temperature in your tortoise’s house, both the hottest and the coolest areas. To do this you will need to use thermometers in their house. The temperature in the vivarium depends on the species of tortoise. Your tortoise’s vivarium temperature should be warmer during the day and cooler at night. The vivarium should have a warmer and a cooler end to allow your tortoise to control his temperature.

If you are not aware of the temperature in your tortoise’s house there is a danger that he could become too hot. As he cannot sweat to cool off, he will need to try to hide in a cooler part of his vivarium. Providing a water bath is a good idea to allow him to cool off. It is also important you have a good quality thermometer inside the vivarium.

It is more common however, for a tortoise to find himself in an environment which is too cold. Cooler temperatures are unlikely to kill him but will put a strain on his body and organs. His muscles, lungs, intestines and heart will struggle to work if they are too cold. If this goes on for a long time it can lead to illness and even death. This is why it is important to learn about your tortoise’s normal activity level as this will change with the temperature.

As well as producing heat and light the sun also produces ultraviolet (UV) light. This is a type of light which we cannot see but tortoises can. It affects the skin and in humans it can cause sunburn. Tortoises use UV light to make vitamin D3. This helps to keep their bones strong and healthy and enables their intestines to absorb calcium from their food. To obtain vitamin D3 he will need exposure to UV light for 12 hours a day. If your tortoise does not receive enough vitamin D3 his shell may become soft and spongy. The shell and the bones act as a huge store for calcium.

UV light can be provided in the form of a combination bulb or a UV tube. The tube needs to be no more than 30-45 cm away from your tortoise’s main basking spot. Remember that a regular UV tube will not provide him with any heat. The bulb should be changed once a year and although it may appear to be working, over time it will become weaker and eventually stop producing any UV light.

In Britain there is a good source of UV light from March until September, so adult tortoises should spend as much time outside as possible on sunny, warm days. If you keep your tortoise outside, ensure he cannot escape.

Humidity is also an important consideration when setting up your tortoise’s house. When water evaporates it forms an invisible gas called water vapor. Humidity is a measure of the amount of water vapor that is present in the air.

In hot dry areas like deserts, there is very little water vapor in the air which means that deserts have low humidity. Rain forests are also hot but have lots of water vapor in the air and so they have high levels of humidity.

The level of humidity required for your tortoise will depend on what sort of tortoise he is and therefore what type of environment he needs. You can use a gadget called a hygrometer to measure the humidity levels in your tortoise’s house to ensure that it is suitable for him.