Tort Report

I think I'm allergic to Spring

Our resident reptiles are up and at 'em.  Isaac & Chomper, as we tell our dog, are the good pets; Desert Tortoises (Gopherus agassizii) and blood brothers.

As the days shortened last October and the air began to chill a little bit, we scooped these guys out of their burrow beneath the backyard  peach tree and slid them under the secretary in our breakfast nook for their winter hibernation period.  A long winter's nap - though, truthfully, not much of a winter here this year.

Isaac, the larger and noisier of the two, was occasionally heard talking in his sleep, with sighs and grunts as we worked on the computer next to the secretary.  Isaac was also the first to rise this Spring, appearing in the middle of the kitchen on Washington's birthday.  He blinked his eyes, asked if I'd put the flag out?  And then enquired if there we had any cherry pie around here for the occasion.  With a "yes" and a "no", I ushered him out the back door for this year's first tortoise dandelion breakfast.

He was enjoying recharging in the warm sun and getting his greens, when following day's forecast called for cooler air and a chance of rain.  So, I brought him back inside.

But with the now awakened tortoise and the sufficiently warm climate controlled indoor environment, he was in no mood for another nap.  So Isaac went off padding around the house while all of us bipedal mammals were at work.  I came home that evening and began to search for him.  I found him in our bedroom.  Isaac had tried to climb out the window, which has a sill 8" off the floor.  This is also the window in front of which Strider's dog bed sits.  Apparently after chasing the dog away, he crawled onto the dog's bed and tried to get out the window, but ended up flipping helplessly on to his back on Strider's bed.  I righted him and then put him outside in the patio dog house (which, unlike the window bed, Strider never uses). 

In the mean time I noticed that there was lots of turtle doo-doo. That is both #1 and #2 on Strider's bed.  Yes, there were several turtle turds and Isaac, after waking up in the relatively warm house apparently had to open the flood gates that had been sphinctered-off for the entire winter.  Must have been kind of like when you stick a fellow camper's hand in a bucket of warm water while they are asleep.  This proverbial trick of getting a sleeping camper to pee in his sleeping bag may or may not work at Camp Wanagopoti, but this trick does appear to work for tortoises coming out of hibernation when exposed to warm air.  Only in this case, Isaac had wet and pooed on Strider's bed - not out in Isaac's own great out-a-doors outhouse. 

Did I hear him right; "I wet your bed! And now you have to sleep in it!"

Strider now has to break in a new bed, one that is way too fluffy for his liking.  And Chomper has now joined Isaac in the back tortoise pasture, diligently doing daily delightful dandelion dining.

Dandelion Daze