Lost a Juvy and .....

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ch4r13s

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Guys,

My sulcatas have their indoor enclosure, and last Saturday Morning, I placed my 3 juvy sulcatas outside for some sunshine, and I am just using a temporary enclosure, that is some kind of foldable type that is being used for Roosters, and then after an hour, I moved the enclosure to one that have half shaded part so they can have some place for cool off, then I came back to check after 15 mins and I can only find 2! 1 Escaped!, I found out that the land on that part is not level, thus there is a way for the tortoise to escape!, EWe practically searched the whole garden, the whole afternoon and we didn't find it. My fear is that it was taken my a cat or a bird, but I'm on a city, there is no large bird, so the only suspect was a cat that it could been took it, so I searched all the premises and even up to neighbors backyard as the cat might just dropped it off, or something.... It was a bad day for me, I lost my first sulcata baby, then already having a head ache over this incident...

Late in the afternoon, to satisfy my desire to protect the other two or for this to not to happen again, I rushed to a Builders Depot, and bought materials for a better outdoor enclosure... so in short I built one, an 8ft x 4ft with bricks and then metal wire mesh on top.. pretty solid..

Then the following morning, as we are finishing the enclosure, I am looking for a huge block of stone to be placed on one of the side to guard the mesh and then at the side of the huge stone, is the lost Juvy Sulcata! We have found it! I am very thrilled and happy, It's a feeling of a lost family member and then came back! :D

We have found that the sulcata found an old small hole near the ground, that we actually searched but not dig enough, and he came out to feed the morning... :D

I will post pics later of this sulcata and the the old and their new outdoor enclosure.
 

oscar

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what a great story, I guess the cat is our of hot water.
 

Jacqui

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What a relief you must be feeling. Your experience is why I have such fears, when folks use temp/moveable pens like you did. I learn quickly, when I first got into tortoises how fast they can become invisible and how well they spot the one place there is to escape from. Glad your story had a happy ending.
 

DixieParadise

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Wow, I know that sunken feeling and then the relief when it turns out for the better. Glad you got your tort back. It was just their way of saying..we want you to build us a more stable structure.. Thank God for Home Depot :)
 

Tom

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So glad you found him. I know the feeling of losing them and I know the feeling of finding them. What a roller coaster! No fun.

Hopefully others will learn from your post and not have to experience the gut wrenching sensations that you just experienced over the last couple of days...

Now tell us: How friggin' hard was it to lay out a few bricks and build a simple rectangle frame with some wire on it? Don't you wish you could go back in time and just build the little brick pen in the first place? ...that's how I feel after an episode like this.
 

ch4r13s

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Thanks for the replies! Yes, what a feeling! and yes, it is so easy to build a better enclosure and I have done this at the first time. I actually created a great indoor, but not yet for outdoor, but now they have more time outside now due to this enclosure and more happy!

@DixieParadise : Yes, it could be it, saying we should have a better enclosure! :D
 

l0velesly

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Glad it came back! I believe if a tortoise wanders off, it will always come back to its home :)
 

cpk

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oohhh that happened to me once too, but my sulcata had escaped under a fence to my neighbor's yard
i was sooo freaked out, but when I found him, I was ssooo happy and relieved. The grass must have looked tastier on the other side :p
 

ch4r13s

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The Escape Artist, Bitong:

imagehay.jpg


And the new Outdoor Enclosure:

imagecopn.jpg
 

tczar

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i found one of my ornates in my raised hot tub the other day, i think its the darn grackle birds.
 
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