>>Well, I have wanted a sulcata for a long time, let me ask a few questions, open to everyone and anyone to answer.
Hopefully someone else will chime in here.. I hate to think we're the only Texans on this board! LOL
I can answer you though so I will...

>>1. I have a "typical" suburban house (at least here in texas). A 6 foot wood fence flush with the ground. About 3000 sqft of backyard with st. augustine grass as well as some bermuda and zorsia (sp?). A dog door goes into the garage. We have only 1-2 days a year of freezing weather. What do you think about keeping a larger female outside? Will they dig under this fence if they are given almost 3000sqft? I have seen pics of ENORMOUS burrows dug by them. Should I worry they are going to dig under the house?

When we first adopted ours we had a dilapidated chainlink fence so we had to hammer rebar into the ground all along the fenceline to keep her from digging out. However in the beginning with her I'd read that if you place dogs houses or something similar around the yard for them to use as hide boxes then they are less likely to dig. We found that to be true with our female.
She never did dig. She has a heated home but we still keep unheated cheap dog houses around for her to use in summer time, she does use them.
She was already 12 inches long when we took her in.. she's never lived inside our house, she just couldn't because my gosh.. have you SEEN the size of the poop? There is NO way we could have ever worked out a place for her inside our house. You have less cold than we do, you should easily be able to keep one outdoors in your region.
About fences:
A fence that cannot see through is best, wood will work as long as it remains a sturdy fence. When our girl was 40 something lbs we had the flimsier ranch fencing around our spineless cactus patch that we'd planted for her. One day she walked right through that ranch fencing and ate all she wanted. We said right then.. if she can do this with the ranch fencing at 40 something lbs, what will she do to the chainlink when she's bigger? We had a new fence built a few months later. LOL
It's cinderblock she's not going through or digging out of this!
Now later when she was mistakenly placed with a male & became gravid she did dig large holes to lay eggs.. but still even after 7 clutchs of eggs- she has not done any digging for any other reason.


>>2. I assume they can live without dying of fright from dogs (as long as the dogs are not attacking them)?
Yes.. in fact our big girl who's about 70lbs today seems very interested in dogs.. but our dog is only 10lbs so he's not going to bother her much. Large dogs can hurt them but if you watch them & keep them apart most of the time they tend to do fine together. Kind of depends on the dog & if the dog accepts the giant tortoise in their territory but the sulcata isn't likely to drop dead from fright at the sight of a dog.

>>3. I'm ready to supplement the diet...will they freely eat these grasses? (heck, maybe I can get rid of my lawn mower).
>>I would be very interested to hear from anyone who lives under "similar" conditions and keeps their sulcata basically as an outdoor pet.
Because we're in a desert setting our soil is naturally high in calcium so I don't worry about calcium supplements. What used to be our lawn has Bermuda & rye grass in it, along with tons of wild broadleafed weeds that we now water instead of try to kill.. she does just fine with her lawn full of grass & weeds. Plus we have mulberry trees & she eats the leaves from the trees too. She freely eats whatever she wants & that makes life very easy for us. However, our fenced in part of the yard is half an acre- we still have to mow because one tortoise by herself just can't eat it all for us.

Now someone else in the Houston or Gulf region chime in on this please!
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PHRatz

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