Setup
The numbers
Thermal gradient
Day: a real gradient, 35°C warm against 21–27°C cool, so the animal chooses. Night: 16°C.
Why
Same scale on every sheet here, so two species compare by eye.
The sheet stateswarm 35 °C / cool 21-27 °C / night 16 °C
Humidity
The sheet stateshumidity gradient of 20-40% on the warm end and up to 60% on the cool end
UVB
The sheet statesArcadia T5 HO 12% or Zoo Med T5 HO Reptisun 10.0, 17-18" above the top of the tortoise's shell
Traceable. The figures above appear in the page we cite, which we opened on 10 Aug 2026. That means you can check them, not that we have confirmed they are right. reptilesupply.com
Drag the sun. The sheet states a night temperature, so the rail follows it.
Enclosure and conditions
What your climate adds
This sheet states a range to hold. Your local climate decides how much work holding it is. Pick the nearest city: nothing is sent anywhere, the choice stays in this browser.
What it needs
Every line above is deduced from a value this sheet states, and names which one. Nothing here is a general recommendation. What the sheet does not state is listed too, rather than left out: a kit that looks complete is worse than one that names its gap.
Food
Diet
Feeding rhythm
Twenty-eight days, one row. Each band is a meal window. The sheet gives several ages on one line; this is the adult figure.
Why
The windows widen as they go because the interval is a range: four meals after a 10–14 day cycle land anywhere between day 40 and day 56.
The sheet stateshigh-fiber herbivorous diet of greens and grasses (cactus pads, kale, collard greens, turnip greens, mustard greens, dandelion greens + flowers, hibiscus leaves + flowers, nasturtium, alfalfa, clover, coreopsis, geranium, grape leaves, bluegrass, Bermuda grass, timothy grass, rye grass, fescue grass); daily to growing juveniles, every other day for adults; never fruit or animal protein
The species
Identity
CITES I is a global listing and holds in every country. National law is not global, and we hold no national wildlife law for any country, Thailand included. Check your own authority before buying or selling.
Questions & sources
Common questions
Why is it so expensive?
It is one of the rarest tortoises, nearly gone in the wild and listed on CITES Appendix I, so only documented captive-bred animals can change hands.
How small does it stay?
The smallest tortoise in this group, around 10 to 13 cm fully grown.
Is it hard to keep?
It needs a very dry, well ventilated setup and stays fragile if kept damp. Not a first tortoise.
What does it eat?
Dry weeds and leafy greens in small portions. It is built for a desert diet, not juicy vegetables.
https://keepr.pet/husbandry/en/testudo-kleinmanni
Others in this group
What this sheet states
This sheet states 6 of 7 of the fields this product runs on. What is missing turns something off: day/night engine and awake count on the globe. We show the gap rather than fill it with a plausible number.
UVB is measured but does not count: it is absent from 420 of 678 sheets, and on most of them that is not a gap, since a nocturnal snake's sheet has no reason to state a UV index. Counting it would call the library incomplete without cause.