Found!

[Yvonne G]

"Daryll" lives out in the country, about 20 miles east of Fresno and he found this tortoise in his shop:




Poor little RF tortoise looks like someone has been keeping him the same way one would keep a desert tortoise. Pretty deformed and dry. Daryll will be bringing me the tortoise later today. I'll post more pictures when I get him.

 

[Yvonne G]

I don't know why the picture didn't post. It was there as I was typing, but when I posted the darned thing it disappeared. This was a copy/paste picture, so I'll take one or two with my camera when I get the tortoise.

 

[Yvonne G]

Let's see if I can "save" it to my computer and then attach it:

 

[MysticCaribou]

Oh No! Poor little guy. So glad you're going to care for him as he should be. Thank you for that. Can't wait to see more photos.

 

[Yvonne G]

Well, only for a short while. He'll be adopted out as soon as I'm sure he's going to be eating and is somewhat healthy.

 

[allegraf]

He's got pluck! he will be fine once he gets the proper care. Gotta love those that suffered, they always have the best attitude and personality. He is cute!

 

[Yvonne G]

I have trouble i.d.ing males and females in the RF, YF species, but there's absolutely NO doubt in my mind that this 'found' turtle is a male:



Let's all make up a story about this tortoise. I get to go first because it's my 'found' tortoise:

Susie Cream Cheese finally broke down and got a baby tortoise for her kids, who had been pestering her for months for a turtle/tortoise. So Susie bought this young tortoise, an aquarium, a light, some substrate, a hiding place, and everything else she thought she'd need for the tortoise. She expected the kids to take an interest in caring for the tortoise because they had been wanting it for such a long time. But as the months went by, Susie found that she was the one left to care for this unwanted animal. No one did any research, and no one really knew anything about the tortoise species. She would toss in a lettuce leaf occasionally, and turn on/off the light when she thought about it, but soon realized it was just too much work and she didn't even like the animal.

So after a couple years of hounding the kids to care for the tortoise, Susie gathered it up in a box, drove out to the country - the foothills east of Fresno, and, without anyone knowing what she was doing, tossed the tortoise out of the car and drove away.

Let's hear your story. What do you think led to this tortoise being found in "Daryll's" garage?

 

[MysticCaribou]

Wow - the way that shell curves is amazing. Poor little guy. Glad he's in a good place now. Couldn't get much better.

 

[Jacqui]

Near tortoise! I am on my way to adopt him now.

 

[Loritort]

Too cute I love the pics! Do they have tortoise rehab?

 

[allegraf]

I prefer to think is is a victim of a Meth Lab and a chemistry teacher who loved tortoises but did not realize how the fumes would cause pyramiding (since he was not a biology teacher). Out of guilt left him in a neighborhood where he could find happiness. Kinda like the "dog went to a farm in the country".

 

[Loritort]

I prefer to think is is a victim of a Meth Lab and a chemistry teacher who loved tortoises but did not realize how the fumes would cause pyramiding (since he was not a biology teacher). Out of guilt left him in a neighborhood where he could find happiness. Kinda like the "dog went to a farm in the country".

I must've missed the joke. Anyways, peace out evryone!

 

[Yvonne G]

I must've missed the joke. Anyways, peace out evryone!

I asked everyone to make up a story as to how the tortoise ended up looking like he does. My made up story is after the pictures, then Allegraf gave us her version. Let's hear yours.

 

[Tidgy's Dad]

A little boy called Adam had always wanted a tortoise, and so when he was old enough, his father a second hand car salesman also called Adam, decided he would buy him one.
They set up the enclosure as correctly as they knew how and tried to recreate the natural habitat of a redfoot tortoise, which Adam Jr. wanted, because they had pretty spotty faces just like him.
Then they went out and bought little Adam, a cute redfoot hatchling and took him home. The humans both fell in love with the adorable tortoise and before long he was beginning to grow, explore his lovely new home, so much better than the pet store they got him from and he became quite content to be stroked and patted and bathed by his food gods.
All was well with the world.
But then, one cloudy night, a flying saucer from the planet Mingmong came to the happy home and the Mingmongians detected an intelligent presence in the house and decided to beam it up to make contact with this new life form. But their matter transmitter was faulty and they missed the humans and instead beamed poor Adam the Redfoot aboard their flying wok. Then they disappeared into hyperspace before the humans knew what had happened Adam Sr. and Adam Jr. were devastated when they awoke to find their beloved tortoise gone! And they could never figure out what had happened to him. Later, they adopted a sulcata and cared for it successfully for many years, up til today, in fact, but they never forgot their fist tort love and still wonder where he went and how he escaped.
Meanwhile the Mingmongians spent many long years trying to communicate with the Earthling they had taken, but with no success. It would simply not tell them it's requirements, so though they fed it what they could, they kept it much too dry, as they had taken it from a desert region and hadn't noticed Adam's lovely enclosure. So poor Adam the Redfoot gradually grew rather deformed and the Mingmongians became more and more frustrated.
Years later, they returned to the Earth and dropped Adam off in a garage near Fresno, because they remembered the cars (Adam Sr. was a car dealer, remember.) The Mingmongians took a parrot from a pet shop in Fresno by mistake and are now busy trying to decipher the 62 words that it speaks.
And Adam the Redfoot was soon off on a new voyage to kind people and a happier life.

 

[Yvonne G]

You give humans too much credit!

 

[Tidgy's Dad]

Channing Bile was a very evil man.
He worked in a pet shop in Fresno as a kitten torturer, but never left a mark on them, the idea being that the kittens looked and sounded so pathetic that when people saw them in the pet shop window and heard their desperate "miaows' they just snapped them up.
The pet shop also sold tortoises, and one evening, Channing stole one to take home because he was a bit cross as his wife had just left him for a beagle as he'd recently eaten her pet chihuahua, Douglas, with some fava beans and a nice Chianti.
So, as he couldn't find his wife, he dumped the poor young redfoot tortoise that he called Doris, after his wife, whose name was Bridget. Later, it turned out Doris was a boy, but Mr Bile neither knew nor cared. He fed the tortoise the dog food left in the cupboard and later the scraps he hadn't eaten for his dinner and rarely gave the poor tortoise a drink or ever cleaned its room.
One day, years later,while Channing was out throwing darts at frogs on the local pond, Doris escaped as the bedroom door had been left open !
Poor Doris was in such pain, as he moved his deformed body along the landing and then ! BOSH ! THUMP ! WALLOP! CRASH! fell down the stairs and KABOOM like a bowling ball crashed into the front door.
It just so happened that Mailman Eric was just doing his delivery and heard the frightful crash! Worried he went to the half-melted plastic gnome that he knew Channing Bile kept a spare key hidden under, for the nights he came home so drunk that he'd often lost his keys. Eric felt under the gnome til he found the key, he was terribly myopic, and then fumbling and feeling around the door handle he located the lock, inserted the key and opened the door. he saw only a blur and went into the house saying, "Hello! Hello !"
No one seemed to be about so Eric stole the microwave, mistaking it for a TV and swiftly vacated the premises, leaving the door open.
Doris went out into the garden and for the first time felt the wonderful warm feel of the sun on his skin. He basked.
After a while he realized he was hungry and ever so thirsty so went forward nervously, blinking in the hot sun .
Outside in the street the Snorkel brothers, local odd job men and peeping Toms were putting the sort of rampy things on to the back of their flatbed truck so that one can push something up and on to it, you know what i mean.
While they went off to get the broken down golf buggy and roll it onto the truck, Doris made his way up the ramp onto the vehicle.
And so it was that he ended up in a garage, unloaded by the Snorkel brothers who just assumed he was a part of the golf buggy that had fallen off.
I should add, that when Channing Bile returned home he was horrified to find his door open, his microwave gone and knowing that it must be Doris who was responsible he rushed upstairs to exact his revenge. Racing into the tortoise room swearing quite a lot in a nasty way, he slipped on the piles of tortoise excrement, shot head first through the window and broke both his legs. Serves him right!

 

[Yvonne G]

Hooray!! Excellent synopsis of poor Doris' pre-found life!!

 

[Big Charlie]

Channing Bile was a very evil man.
He worked in a pet shop in Fresno as a kitten torturer, but never left a mark on them, the idea being that the kittens looked and sounded so pathetic that when people saw them in the pet shop window and heard their desperate "miaows' they just snapped them up.
The pet shop also sold tortoises, and one evening, Channing stole one to take home because he was a bit cross as his wife had just left him for a beagle as he'd recently eaten her pet chihuahua, Douglas, with some fava beans and a nice Chianti.
So, as he couldn't find his wife, he dumped the poor young redfoot tortoise that he called Doris, after his wife, whose name was Bridget. Later, it turned out Doris was a boy, but Mr Bile neither knew nor cared. He fed the tortoise the dog food left in the cupboard and later the scraps he hadn't eaten for his dinner and rarely gave the poor tortoise a drink or ever cleaned its room.
One day, years later,while Channing was out throwing darts at frogs on the local pond, Doris escaped as the bedroom door had been left open !
Poor Doris was in such pain, as he moved his deformed body along the landing and then ! BOSH ! THUMP ! WALLOP! CRASH! fell down the stairs and KABOOM like a bowling ball crashed into the front door.
It just so happened that Mailman Eric was just doing his delivery and heard the frightful crash! Worried he went to the half-melted plastic gnome that he knew Channing Bile kept a spare key hidden under, for the nights he came home so drunk that he'd often lost his keys. Eric felt under the gnome til he found the key, he was terribly myopic, and then fumbling and feeling around the door handle he located the lock, inserted the key and opened the door. he saw only a blur and went into the house saying, "Hello! Hello !"
No one seemed to be about so Eric stole the microwave, mistaking it for a TV and swiftly vacated the premises, leaving the door open.
Doris went out into the garden and for the first time felt the wonderful warm feel of the sun on his skin. He basked.
After a while he realized he was hungry and ever so thirsty so went forward nervously, blinking in the hot sun .
Outside in the street the Snorkel brothers, local odd job men and peeping Toms were putting the sort of rampy things on to the back of their flatbed truck so that one can push something up and on to it, you know what i mean.
While they went off to get the broken down golf buggy and roll it onto the truck, Doris made his way up the ramp onto the vehicle.
And so it was that he ended up in a garage, unloaded by the Snorkel brothers who just assumed he was a part of the golf buggy that had fallen off.
I should add, that when Channing Bile returned home he was horrified to find his door open, his microwave gone and knowing that it must be Doris who was responsible he rushed upstairs to exact his revenge. Racing into the tortoise room swearing quite a lot in a nasty way, he slipped on the piles of tortoise excrement, shot head first through the window and broke both his legs. Serves him right!

I don't think anyone can beat this story!

 

[wellington]

LOL quite the stories. Poor tort. As deformed as he is, he is cute.

 

[Reptilian Feline]

Little Maisy Brown wanted a dog, a little one, but her parents wouldn't get her one because they are so messy. After a bit of arguing and a lot of tears, her parents bought her a redfoot tortoise from a shelter, and told her that the tortoise was a red dwarf dalmatian. She loved her puppy, fed him plenty of kibble and walked him in her room every day.
One day he escaped when she was playing with him in the yard... she threw the ball too far and went to fetch it (he never fetched the ball anyway), and the ice cream truck came by. She totally forgot about her puppy until after dinner, and then she couldn't find him. Her parents told her that the puppy had found a new home and so little Maisy Brown had no dog no more.
The redfoot found his way into a garage, where he went to sleep, and that's how he ended up at Darryl's place.