Much like springtime with the tortoises, it's time for us to come out of brumation. As many of you know, the Tort Resort moved unexpectedly in December 2019. It was a move necessary for our peace of mind as well as a change of scenery. We've relocated to beautiful Whidbey Island, with a quarter-acre and room for the tortoises and dogs to roam! With this change, we needed to consider where to place the new enclosures. This meant a year of watching where the sun hit the backyard during each season. Unfortunately, the place which best suited the tortoises needed to be graded and leveled. Pioneer Tree and Landscape had this nifty stand-on grader and came to the rescue! After several hours of scooping, measuring and leveling, the rest was left to me. All the blocks and lumber were brought from the last house. New 1/4 inch hardware cloth was laid and everything was reassembled (extra boxes were also added) into a long 40ft x 4ft space. Hardware cloth is important to housing your tortoises outside. It not only prevents your animals from digging out, it provides a barrier to keep digging predators from infiltrating your enclosure! Remember to make your enclosures tall enough to accommodate nesting torts and roots for your landscape. We recommend at least two feet in height, taller if you want plants like snapdragons and coneflowers! Lids are essential - ours are coming - they keep the flying and four-legged predators out. We really want to stress the importance of lids. As soon as our torts had the opportunity to start soaking up sunshine, two eagles began circling. As a stop-gap, we let the dogs out into the yard and laid the previous enclosure lids over the top of the new structure. Stoli (above) and the others in his group were able to safely eat and gather the all important natural UV!
As soon as the new structures are complete, we'll post some follow up photos.
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AuthorThe Tort Resort is a Whidbey Island based project dedicated to rescue and rehab of smaller tortoise species. Archives
June 2021
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