How to grow your own food
 

Hi, I want to grow my own food for my horsfield, however I'm very new to gardening, let alone making the food safe for the tortoises health. Could anyone give me advice on what soil to use, I was going to get topsoil so I know it is clean and mix calcium into it to get absorbed into the food? Would stuff grow in this without compost, if not what compost is safe? For reference, I have brought the luxury seed packs from Shelled Warriors eBay page and that is how I found this :D thank you in advance for any advice for a complete novice!

Hi there...do you mean to grow under lamps in the soil? or separate to the Tortoise enclosure? if in with Tort try to get bland natural soil like coco coir or anything that hasn't got loads of fertiliser. Coco coir is good for growing also (natural), spider plants pansies etc..depends what you are after indoors or out.. and coco coir is good for most torts to live on and in...watch out for fungi though on any soil. can cause RNS, CB

I used a seed tray with top soil in (the same I used for substrate), so that I grew the weeds outside of the indoor pen and once they had grown placed the seed tray in. The idea being to just change the tray. I didn't do this for long as had so many weeds/flowers in garden. However, I have just planted one up again to see what selection of weeds and flowers may come up for more variety.

I just stuff weeds n amongst the borders.....they look lovely when they are flowering!! I don't every use fertiliser or slug pellets as we have hedgehogs so the soil is clean!! If you do use 'products' on your garden it could be worth using a selected patch to keep clean. I have just planted up the gravel around the bungalow with broad leaf plantain. X X hugs X X X

Thank you for your replies. i plan on doing similar to Jan W, growing in trays outside separate to the tortoise and then move across. It is good to know that they grow in natural/clean soil, I'll look into the coco coir, thank you!

I have been buying my coir from Ikea. However, I understand it is cheaper to buy on line, but I haven't had a chance to do that - not sure why! It is lovely stuff.