Help please

[alby28]

Well i've just taken the leap and bought a horsfiled from a couple in St Helen.They seemed to be well in on their reptiles and have no real reasons to doubt them.Anyway,Mr T came complete with table,UV lighting and Heatlamp.Now my questions are,the heat lamp is just a standard desk lamp with a 25 watt ball bulb in it.Is this gonna provide enough heat?Also,since reading through the forums,should i have been given papers for the Mr T?If so,and they dont have any for him what do i do?Also diet needs,they said they have been feeding him tescos own brand bagged mixed salad leaves and carrot,broccoli and cauliflower tescos bagged.Is this good enough?I know i am gonna have to buy powders and such.



Mark

[sheridan]

hi,

veggies and salad are a no no. im not sure if you should continue feeding these to him because he is used to them perhaps someone else can give you advise on that but personally i would change it straight away! feeds him weeds weeeds and more weeds. take a look at the edible weeds section for some great ideas. i have a horsfield and he loves petunias and dandelions.
you will needs to get him some supplements. i am fairly new to keeping torts and i bought all i needed from the shelled warriors shop. take a look in that section of the forum. this is a great forum and everyone is really friendly. have a read of some of the posts already in housing section there is lots of advise on heating!! dont worrry about how many questions u need to ask because someone will always be more than willing to help and have some great advise

sheridan x

[sandy]

Horsfield (russian)tortoises do not at the moment need paperwork.
They do need a UV light strip or UV lamp which is a combination of heat and light. UV is vital
for their health and well being, and will become ill without it.
Do a search on here for any informantion needed, or go to www.thetortoisehouse.com or
www.tortoises.net. Both are great sites for information to browse at your leisure.

[EJ]

How and why would you say such a thing???????

A tortoise will not become ill without UV if it is supplemented with another source of vitamin D which means that there are alternatives to using UV.

Originally Posted by sandy

Horsfield (russian)tortoises do not at the moment need paperwork.
They do need a UV light strip or UV lamp which is a combination of heat and light. UV is vital
for their health and well being, and will become ill without it.
Do a search on here for any informantion needed, or go to www.thetortoisehouse.com or
www.tortoises.net. Both are great sites for information to browse at your leisure.

[nina]

Hi, and congratulations on your new tortoise! A 25W bulb probably won't be strong enough - you want a 60W bulb (household spotlight), or a 100 W bulb (but your desk lamp might not take that). What you want to achieve is a temperature of around 85F at one end of the table, and about 70F at the other (sleeping) end, and no heat at night. If you stay with the separate heat and UVB sources, then I'd recommend the Reptisun 10.0 UVB fluorescent tube (and do buy a clip-on reflector for it - it saves your eyes and also increases the amount of UVB reaching the tort by up to 30%.
And do read the material on those two sites that Sandy gave you - they're great.

[Caroline McI]

Ooh I didn't know you could get clip on reflectors Nina, I'll put that on my list of things to buy, this list is growing by the day

[nina]

Originally Posted by Caroline McI

Ooh I didn't know you could get clip on reflectors Nina, I'll put that on my list of things to buy, this list is growing by the day

They're great, Caroline - really save your eyes from looking into the glare - and they don't cost much (you ought to be able to get one from wherever you got your fluorescent tube, or you could do a makeshift one with aluminium foil).

[Caroline McI]

You know, when I'd been admiring all those photos of indoor tables I wondered what that was over the strip light, I thought it was foil but thought I must be daft.

[Beverley]

Hi EJ, what alternatives to UV do you mean ?
Beverley

[EJ]

Vitamin supplements... a half hour of sunshine a day... probably less than that is actually needed for a tortoise... other sources of vitamin D or it's precursor.

I'm curious how tortoises have been kept in the UK for well over a hundred years without the use of UV bulbs. That is why I'm so amazed at that statement.

Those kind of statements are becoming quite common in certain circles and it is very misleading and quite... wrong. Comments such as 'a viv will kill your tortoise' or 'protein does cause pyramiding' or 'veggies will kill your tortoise or cause pyramiding' such statements are quite short sighed and it is a shame that many new tortoise keepers actually follow that stuff as law.

Originally Posted by Beverley

Hi EJ, what alternatives to UV do you mean ?
Beverley