New Pancake Habitat

     I recently decided to upgrade my Pancake Tortoise's home. I used the same technique for the substrate and irrigation as in every other habitat.  You can see the grass is growing nicely, the lettuces I planted are being grazed upon, and the two spineless catuses are doing well also.

     Unique to this cage is the tiered hiding escarpment I made for him.  I used ceramic tiles for each "floor" and slate as the spacers to make the basic levels. Beneath the structure and within the center wall I used a 50 watt heating wire made by Exo Terra.  Utilizing a dimmer switch with the heat wire I have the tiles in a stable, low 90sF range.  Without the dimmer the heat wire warms the tiles to over 110F, a bit hot for his "cumfy" place.  The heat lamp has his basking spot at around 105.  Between the heated surfaces, lamp and the ret of the cage, he is able to thermoregulate very well.

You can see the wire for the heat tape to the right.  And I may find a new place for my weekly tortoise chore chart.

HE isn't much of a grass eater but those lettuce may last another week and that cactus shoot's days are numbered as well.

One of my favorite pats about raising tortoises is watching their shell patterns come in.  The radiating lines have been there from the beginning, but as you can see he has completely different "striping" beginning around the edges of his scutes with much more white.  It kind of looks like my leopard tortoises.

Being avid climbers i had to design this habitat with climbable surfaces but also keep them far enough from the walls to prevent a means of overzealous exploration leading to escape.

The wire hanging down is the temperature probe I use to monitor his hiding spot.