Archives of The Cold Blooded News

The Newsletter of the Colorado Herpetological Society

Volume 29, Number 11;   November, 2002

Little Tiny Turtle

Submitted by Susan M. Tellem, American Tortose Rescue

We started making calls to officials at the local shelters and the police department. Finally, several weeks later, victory! The turtles had been confiscated from the vendor at Venice Beach and were in custody at a local shelter. We rushed down there to claim our babies before they were euthanized but the shelter staff was reluctant to release them to ATR because of the salmonella problem that occurs in reptiles, especially water turtles.

I'm really good at throwing fits especially when the "e" word (euthanasia) is used. We pleaded with the staff to hand over the tiny turtles, most the size of quarters, to our care. We were told to take two to a local vet and have a salmonella test...in the meantime the staff would care for the babies.

Two days, fifty-five dollars and a clean bill of health later, we went to the shelter and picked up the cutest bunch of babies this side of Cleveland. We'd taken in desert tortoises, box turtles and one wet cooter, but never a giant gaggle of turtles this tiny or this wet.

We bought a horse water basin, three giant clamp on lights and dumped all the babies in the warm water. Are they cute! We couldn't take our eyes off these little dolls and started picking out the ones we wanted to keep. There were Tricker and Treat, the original two tested by the vet (well, for goodness sake we had to keep the test babies); there was Sickly Turtle, the one who mouth breathed; there was Brows, a painted turtle with huge yellow painted on hussy eyebrows; Gimpy, the three-legged turtle; and of course, "Little Tiny Turtle," our teeny baby the size of an undersized nickel.

These special children moved into the kitchen with us so we could observe their behavior and make all the same mistakes new parents make with their infants. Our cats were especially pleased to see new reptiles that they could stalk through the glass.

About a week later, after many feedings and lots of dirty water, we decided to start adoption proceedings. By the way, a wet/dry vacuum does the trick on emptying dirty tanks quickly and efficiently.

Let the Adoptions Begin
We sent out notices to all the local turtle clubs - the Valley CTTC was great - we rendezvoused at the Federal Building parking lot and did a "turtle drop" as we now call it, exchanging babies from our bucket to theirs. They had plenty of adoptive parents looking for newborns. The San Diego Turtle and Tortoise Society was also great - we did a turtle drop down there at a reptile show - how appropriate.

We no sooner placed the first 150, and another call came in...same stupid turtle seller at the beach...another load of babies. This time we were ready and picked them up right away.

We put a notice on the Internet through the reptile newsgroup and some other bulletin boards, and got calls from all over the country. Boy, people really love their turtles. In the meantime, Sickly Turtle's health improved, Brows grew to the size of a shoehorn and Little Tiny Turtle, well he was still Little Tiny Turtle not growing one speck.

We arranged to send our cute little charges all over the country - the first shipment of 16 went to this wonderful turtle lover in New York named Suzanne Brown. We sent them Fedex - we were up all night worrying about them - and they arrived safe and sound. You spritz them with water and put them in an egg carton which is the perfect size for shipping. This way they don't bounce around.

Then the weather turned cold so we confined our adoptions to Southern California so we wouldn't have to worry if the overnight shipping services got snowed in and kept our babies from getting delivered. Out of more than 300 babies, we only lost five at our rescue - cause unknown - but this is probably a better track record than human babies who don't thrive. With the Spring weather warming the other parts of the country, we were able to ship to Wisconsin, Washington state, and Northern California. Just today, I got an e-mail that our New York connection wants more. All have survived the shipping experience. We are probably more traumatized than they are.

It's Over For Now
So now we are down to four of our own (yes we had to give up Tricker and Treat because demand was so great). Brows, who is as big as a house, has moved to a beautiful tank with the bigger turtles outside; Gimpy is growing steadily and is still in the kitchen along with Sickly Turtle, who is no longer mouth breathing, and, yes you guessed it, Little Tiny Turtle is still tiny. He/she is so adorable and we are always cheering it on. "Go Little Tiny Turtle, get your food." "Go Little Tiny Turtle, don't let the big guys try and push you around!" (Last March, Tiny Turtle died from unknown causes.)

This was written in 1996. A lot has changed since then.