by Donna Swagerty Shreve
Ernie liked to hang out with Fido and Freida and share their heat lamp.
My husband is a regular jogger. His route has varied from a 7 mile loop to a now 3 mile loop. Along his various routes, he has seen various items discarded along the way. He has, on many occasions, brought home some treasures. He has found good tools such a a wrench, screw drivers, utility knife, golf balls, tennis balls and then there was Fido.
John greeted me from his jog with a tortoise in his hand. He had found him in the middle of a road and tried to rescue him. First, John picked him up and placed him on a lawn. This was not to the tortoise’s liking and he quickly returned to the middle of the road. This happened in November and the road was warmer than any lawn. However, John was determined to save this wayward tortoise. First, he went to a few nearby houses to see if anyone was missing a tortoise or knew of a household that was. No such luck. He even went back the next day and did a more extensive investigation. John felt the tortoise could not be left to his own devices as that would seal his doom.
At first we were not sure if he was a turtle or tortoise. I made up a makeshift enclosure that had a good portion of water and a small area in the corner that was on high ground and dry. The next morning the creature was huddling in the dry corner. Now John decided to name him Fido as it was such an absurd name for a reptile. We did some research and discovered that turtles have webbed feet. Fido did not have webbed feet. Fido was a tortoise. Now what kind of a tortoise was he?
Did we have one of the desert species that lived hundreds of years? Fido turned out to a Russian tortoise and had a life span of maybe 50 years. He was still small and had some more growing to do. We always made sure he had yummy food for a tortoise and removed any water. He now had an enclosure that covered a table in our second bedroom. We put in a heat lamp and set up a small enclosure where he could hide if he wanted privacy. What Fido really wanted was escape. He spent much time trying to climb out of his four foot by six foot pan.
Our cats enjoyed joining him under the heat lamp. Fido enjoyed getting close to our warm cats. It would seem they liked each other. On occasion Fido was released to roam around our tiled kitchen. Fido had to be carefully watched as he would hide under appliances or escape into other rooms. Other times Fido has allowed out on one of our side patios that was well enclosed. He would wait for one of us to walked by his room and then he made it known he wanted an adventure by banging against the side of his pen or rigorously trying to climb up the side of his cage. I started reacting to his demands as I encouraged him to communicate to us. After Fido had been out on the patio for a time, he would then bang on the patio door to be let back in.
All of our attempts at Club Med status were still not enough to make Fido content. He needed a partner we decided. After some more research, my husband found a reptile show in the conference center in Sacramento. One of the vendors had several Russian tortoises for sale. We wanted a female. As we entered the conference center we realized we must be unusual reptile owners. We did not have a bunch of tattoos, many piercings or spiked hair. Finding a tortoise was tame compared to some of the other creatures available.
There were a variety of lizards, spiders, turtles and tortoises. We found our vendor and left with Freida. She had been raised with her five brothers in a backyard in Las Vegas. She was also young and had some growing to do.
When we arrived home we introduced Fido to Freida. We placed them on our front lawn to give them some room. Fido became quite excited and rushed toward Freida. Freida was not impressed and tried desperately to out run Fido. Fortunately for Freida she was able to fit under the smaller structure in the pen and could usually escape Fido’s enthusiastic welcome.
Freida was able to benefit from our research on Fido and never had to endure a water enclosure. We did provide a small container of water and daily food. We learned what they preferred from our variety on the menu. One of their favorites were dandelion flowers. On John’s jogs, now he would return with quite a bouquet which always quickly disappeared. There must have been curious looks as this jogger guy kept picking dandelions daily off of neighbors’ lawns along the way.
We had invited a couple over for dinner one evening. I was in the kitchen fixing our meal and John came into the kitchen quite concerned. He was convinced something was terribly wrong with Fido. Fido’s guts were protruding and John was quite concerned. After he had described what he witnessed, I was rather sure that Fido wasn’t losing anything but rather excited about Freida. Male tortoises need to be quite well endowed to be able to reach the female and impregnate her. During this display Freida was huddling in the small enclosure. Fido was not to be refused. He went to the end of the enclosure and started biting Freida’s tail until she came out into the open.
Freida laid several eggs but they were never vital. Fido was shooting blanks because we did not set them up to hibernate. Hibernation is necessary for tortoises to be fertile. One day I was reading and the house was very quiet. I heard a horrible shriek and went to investigate. It was Fido. Tortoises do not make any noise unless they are male and are mating. We had tortoise porn right inside our home.
Life continued for the next ten years with dud eggs, shrieks and Freida’s deformed tail. They received outside adventures and exercise and Fido continued to communicate. Then Fido was ailing and we were at a loss on how to help him. We found him dead one morning and John took him back to a jogging trail up on the levee. We were sending Fido back to nature.
Freida was now free but she had no distractions or excitement. We did some more research and found a place that would take reptiles to rehouse them. John took Freida in and the first question the person asked was, “What happened to her tail?” John explained that Freida had a very aggressive roommate. We then claimed our second bedroom back. When we did have company, the tortoises were moved. We had also introduced our grandson to the tortoises every time he visited as we were convinced he would eventually end up with them.
We tried to make their enclosure full of luxury but it only worked for ten years. I can only hope Freida found a better home than ours and that her tail has been left alone. We enjoyed their company while we had them and learned to appreciate their breed.
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