Putting Billy to bed! How we put our family tortoise Billy into a safe hibernation...

We all adore our family tortoise, Billy - he is a real character with an appetite to match!

Here I'll show you how to prepare your tortoise for their annual snooze, in a safe and snug environment.

Before you say your annual farewell, conduct your final weigh in.

We hibernate Billy from roughly mid-November through to the Spring. 

When you hibernate a tortoise, they shouldn't eat or drink anything for at least 3 weeks prior. It's important that their stomach etc is empty. 

After weighing, we pop our tortoise into a cardboard box filled with shredded paper for warmth and comfort. 

This box is placed inside a further polystyrene box, good for temperature regulation, then wrapped with chicken wire. 

Tragically, we have heard some unfortunate stories about tortoises and unwelcome rodents, so it really is important to wrap them up nice and snug, with good protection all round.

We pop the lids (with holes punched through for good air circulation) onto each of our boxes, wrap the wire around securely and place Billy on a high shelf within our garage for the Winter - ready to welcome him back in March!

Love, Charlie x