It’s started raining. This spot was supposed to be a flower garden. I’d put up a little enclosure here and let the cute baby tortoises play, but as you can see, the fence was broken by the typhoon. And the tortoises have grown a lot. Look, they’re palm-sized now! So we decided to give them more room and turn the whole flower bed into a tortoise playground.
Planning the space
The bed is made of wood, so I figured I could nail on some walls to make a fence. I’m only clearing weeds around the edges, since the tortoises eat them. Why are you two piled up? So cute. Grow up fast!
These tortoises don’t drink through their mouths; they take in water through their skin. I’ve shown before how I bathe them every day or two. I’m thinking of putting a tiny pool in here so they can bathe whenever they like, which I hear is how it’s done when they’re grown. The area is about 120 by 45 centimeters. Pretty big, right?
My blunder
I found net pieces in a handy length. Then, not being very smart, I looked at the playground, thought “tortoises don’t need much height,” and cut a whole pile of 30-centimeter posts. But the net is taller than 30 centimeters! I’m not that silly, though: posts as tall as the net went in the four corners, and the short ones became supports in between. (Someone’s face says I am silly.)
Done! Please ignore the slightly crooked part. Flowers didn’t grow well here, the tortoises kept walking out, and the temporary fence broke in the typhoon, so now there’s a proper one. Look, Shimako, tortoises! In they go. Eat as much as you like! They started eating right away.
About our tortoises
For anyone new: in English these are African spur-thighed tortoises, or sulcata tortoises. They’re babies of a very large tortoise species, and they’re completely herbivorous. They don’t care much for commercial food, so I give them natural things: weeds, violas, a slightly wilted dandelion that won’t bloom, a yellow-and-orange vegetable whose name I forgot (Swiss chard, maybe), a pretty flower that’s very bitter, and SunPatiens, which I checked is not harmful to tortoises. And of course their favorite, bok choy, bought on sale. In the ground they’d trample it to nothing, so it’s going in a separate pot, and they’ll get a little each day.
The viola flowers are vanishing fast! Someday these little ones will weigh over 100 kilograms, and an enclosure like this will mean nothing. But for now they’re still small. Is it roomy enough?
Thank you for watching Chicken Paradise Hawaii! See you next time.