[Ozric Jonathan]

Hi Greg

I've used a ceramic heat emitter inside a coldframe but this did tend to use quite a lot of electricity. I think a lot of the heat was lost to the outside.

Gordon, one of our most experienced members, keeps some his tortoises in a large wooden box heated by a tubular heater on a thermostat at night. I haven't got round to it but I'm going to make one of these for mine.

Tubular heaters are cheap to buy and run. They take the edge off the cold.

I keep hermanns and not horsfields but I think we all find the same this time of year. Lower temperature, shorter daylength and even the position of the sun in the sky are picked up by the tortoise and they all point to the same thing.

That's good getting your tort outside, all Med species thrive with access to outside.