For this project, I leaned toward the "not so much" side. I needed a simple tractor that would prevent predators from entering and tortoises from escaping, that could be dragged around as needed. It needed to have room for a hide box and a water bowl of some sort. It needed to have some type of screening on the bottom, and hinged screen tops for easy access on top. The side walls could be solid or screened, and it needed some wheels at one end to roll it from one place to the next.

Scanning my scrap pile my eyes first fell upon some 1 x 10 x 8-foot white pine boards from a dismantled shelving project from long ago. These would make perfect side walls, so I grabbed them up, along with some leftover poultry screen and some welded wire fencing scraps.

I had five of the 8-foot boards to work with, so that determined some of the limitations of my project. Cutting one of them into four 2-foot sections, I had the materials to make two tortoise tractors. With a few minutes and a few deck screws, I quickly had the basic frame built. My finished tractors would be roughly 8 feet x 2 feet when done, plenty of space for some baby tortoises to roam around.

After screening the bottom of one tractor with poultry wire, I determined it was blocking much of the vegetation from coming through, so I covered the bottoms of each tractor with welded wire with a much larger "weave." This allowed much more grass through and was still too small for the tortoises to squeeze through. I used a staple gun with very long staples to attach the welded wire fencing to the back, going back to "set" each staple into the wood with a hammer, locking the wire in place and replacing any bad staples I found as I went along.

I flipped the unit over, and it was time to start on the screen door tops. They were going to be simple, dirty, and quick. I grabbed some 2 x 2 x 8s from the scrap pile, leftovers from some mouse rack builds, and I cut four of them in half, 48 inches. I then cut up two more into four 2-foot sections. I screwed the 2-foot sections onto the ends of the 4-foot sections; the screen door frames would overhang the ends just slightly, but provided some play to account for any warpage in the wood. Covering the bottom of the door frames with poultry wire, I again stapled it in place with long staples, set with a hammer. Attaching the screen door frames with some inexpensive hinges sourced from Home Depot, I was almost done.

The final touches to the tortoise tractor were the addition of wheels at one end and a drag handle at the other. I didn't have any lawn mover wheels I could steal for this project, and so, oddly, found myself at Tractor Supply Company looking for lawnmower wheels for the tractor. Buying four $5 wheels and 1/2 x 2 inch lag screws, I used a 26 inch 2 x4 scrap and built an axle for each tractor. Attaching the axle at the end of each tractor with the wheels barely touching the ground when flat, when lifted at the other end the wheels would engage the ground and allow the unit to be rolled. Drilling two holes at the top of the other end wall allowed me to use a rope scrap as the drag handle. And then the tortoise tractor was ready for tortoises!