Any people with experience raising turtles or tortoises?

[~boogiepop~]

I know I should probably be going to a turtle forum for this, but I'd rather ask people I'm comfortable with first, and ones who live in a similar climate.

I have a tortoise, he is very adorable and I love him. I'm currently worried that his shell may be pyramiding. I've read a lot of websites about it but they all say different things. So I was curious if I could get some input from people who have had hands on experience with animals like this in a Northwest climate.

First I wanted to know if all pyramiding it bad? I've read sites saying that you are a terrible owner if your pet pyramids and things that most captive tortoises do have pyramiding, it is very common, and is only really bad when it is extreme. I can take a picture of my little friend later, in case anyone could visually identify if this is a problem.

What do you guys do to get natural sunlight on your reptile in the cold months? Pretty much at this point, I don't wanna bring him outside. I'm still new to this and I'm afraid he'll be too cold. He isn't near a window or anything so he's only getting light from a lamp right now.

I'd also like an opinion on his enclosure.

Ths is what I've currently got set up, though it's a little different than that now. The lamp is now tied to the bottom of that brown chair so it's closer, it keeps the area close to that around 80-85 degrees. I'm not sure what else to get more heat for him besides that. I did have a heating pad under the plastic but it burned a hole in the carpet and broke. Substrate is 50% soil, 50% play sand. I pour a pan of water in it once a week, and change it once a month. It's a lot better then he used to have. I've gone through vets, sites, and tried at least 6 different types of substrates. This seems to be what he likes the best.

One last thing too, he's very picky. He won't eat anything but leafy greens (which is good, I can't buy a lot of **** at once, so I'll switch out what he eats every week. He'll eat Green Leaf, Red Leaf, Kale (where can you get kale in town? I can only find it at farmers markets which are going to die out soon), and spinach.) But he also loves the hell out of dandelions. I know this is the dumbest question ever but can you buy them anywhere or do you grow your own for your tortoises? How do you go about that. I've read that all tortoises pretty much dig the hell out of them so I was curious about ways to farm them.

Anways thats it. I wanted to get this out there to see if anybody here was educated in this stuff. I'll post pictures asap when I get home.
Here is a picture for helping though. This is him, his name is Trotsky and I love him sososososososososososososososososo much <3

[DancingTofu]

It sounds like Trotsky's well taken-care-of, so I wouldn't worry about him.  The heat lamp should be fine for the winter, although if you put his enclosure somewhere where it'll catch the sunlight (even if it's overcast) during the afternoon, that will help reinforce his body clock.  I don't have much tortoise experience personally but I've lived with them and taken care of them briefly and it sounds like you're doing everything right.

[DemonSpawn]

I would also like to add that he's adorable. O:
I <3 Turtles but I've never had one personally. C:

[jaybug]

I recommend not taking him to Mexico City where he might get assassinated.

What about a water bed heating element? But then you may want a box in a box to have the inside one sitting in a water bath. Probably not.

That or keep him off the floor. Higher sides on the enclosure.

I won't tell the Feds your turtle is operating a pyramid scheme.

Today was a good day to go outside for a turtle walk. Would he eat snails, or slugs? I have plenty of both if you need some.

Good luck! I think it's cool you have a turtle. Dunno why though.

[melchizedek]

Just make sure he has a cosplay he is happy with and he should be okay.