Tort Pen Step Seven: The Addition

We haven't moved in, and we already need an addition!! Burrow number two:

The palms in front are dwarf date palms. Very spiny.

Another view.

I feel like this really balanced it out, as well as being best for the torts. What's five hours work and $115 more...

Lest we forget...This is one heck of a "project!" I missed out on a baby shower uke01: for this!

Thanks for looking! Time for dinner!

Nanci

Nanci, I can't begin to tell you how much I enjoy what you are doing. How did you decide on the torts you have. I live in Southern Oregon and would love to plan something like this. Any ideas of where to start? thanks, susan

Nanci said:

Lest we forget...This is one heck of a "project!" I missed out on a baby shower uke01: for this!

Thanks for looking! Time for dinner!

Nanci

Click to expand...

Don't you mean, you GOT OUT of a baby shower for this? Baby showers are such bizarre American customs . . .

It looks bloody amazing Nanci! You did such a fantastic job.

This is looking simply fantastic, Nanci. I can't wait to see the torts move in!

susang said:

Nanci, I can't begin to tell you how much I enjoy what you are doing. How did you decide on the torts you have. I live in Southern Oregon and would love to plan something like this. Any ideas of where to start? thanks, susan

Click to expand...

I have this friend who has a girlfriend that had a box turtle a long time ago. I suggested that a perfect Christmas present for her would be a box turtle and set up. A different friend of ours had hatchlings in South Carolina. So he got her the turtle, but the turtle never did well. Then she took it to my vet and it died. Guess who's to blame for that? So she works at the university, and was friends with a guy who's a parasitologist specializing in reptiles who is also into tortoise respiratory disease research. He knew of a project that was winding down that had 30 three-year old torts who they were looking for adoptive homes for, rather than euthanizing them. My friend took three, I took two, a guy I work with took two, and the rest al went to other homes. I think the researcher kept her favorites. (Then she got a job at CDC and went to Africa to work on bird flu.)

All the states that Desert Torts are native to have adoption programs- California, Nevada and Arizona. It's relatively easy to adopt one out there.

If I were going to pick a tortoise, I'd choose something reasonable, not one of the giants. I'd want to keep it outside for as much of the year as possible. If the winter was too cold to brumate outside, I'd take the adult size of the tortoise into consideration- it'd have to be small enough to get into the basement. There are a ocuple that stay small enough to stay in the house if they have to- and some people with the bigger ones turn over whole rooms to them eventually rather than trying to pen them- but most tortoises are grazing animals and do best when they are out grazing.

Nanci

desertanimal said:

Don't you mean, you GOT OUT of a baby shower for this? Baby showers are such bizarre American customs . . .

Click to expand...

I know! But there was going to be really good food!

Nanci

Looking great Nanci! seriously you have done a great job!

I'm sure they will love it, and you will enjoy watching them on that bench

:cheers: well done.

You did an awesome job ! What a lot of work. I hope you'll post pics of the guys in their new home

I am in awe! It's a good thing that Tootsie (Russian Tortoise) has no access to a computer. She would be insanely jealous!

Joanna

The hardest part was just coming up with a definite plan and then buying the lumber. Just getting started! Now it's all fun- all the planting and arranging. I'm just dying to get home and work on the pond. But I need two more somethings for the corner of it! Plus a ton more plants for the tops of the burrows. It rained today- I hope I don't go home to bare garbage cans! :eek1:

Nanci

Sweet... The second burrow really adds to the whole pen too. That was fast too, as weren't you just thinking about adding the second burrow yesterday or the day before? lol... I suppose since you'd already had the other half of the can it was easy to just drop it in there. *G*

Definitely looking forward to seeing what you put in next!

Jenn

Well, I'm at the end of spending till a week from Friday, after the last two days. I just didn't feel like tackling the pond yesterday, but forced myself to plant some new stuff. Here's a big purple verbena on Burrow #2. This is something they can and will eat.

This is the side of Burrow #2. It has a new "love Grass," the smaller blueish grass, which will be about two feet tall- pretty small. The big green bushy thing in the middle back is a Centennial Magnolia, which will mature at 20 feet tall. It is deciduous, though, so will lose its leaves in the winter, and then bloom big white and pink flowers on bare branches in the spring.

This is the current layout for the pond. The fig is in the back. I want to keep it pruned into a weeping shape and not let it go crazy. On the left is a dwarf Crape Myrtle, which will flower this summer. It will only get 3 feet tall- and won't block the view from the front of the pen. On the right is a standard Crape Myrtle, which will get 15-25 feet tall, but will be open and airy, with really pretty peeling bark in a few years. Then I'll fill in around the edges with flowers.



So that's the next step- finish installing the drip irrigation and put in the pond.

Thanks for looking!

Nanci

Nanci, do you ever actually find time to sleep???
Have you done this all my yourself or do you have help?
It's looking so beautiful, those little guys will be in heaven! :cheers:

All by myself. I usually get in from working on it at 8PM. By then the torts have been asleep for a couple hours, so they haven't seen any of this since I built the second burrow! (In the pics that they are in, I rousted them out of bed to look nice in the pictures.)

Nanci