2.8 miles in 16 days.
You’ve got some competition there @OldGreyFox 
3 Likes
That’s one sprightly tortoise Mr Smith, he’d definitely give me a run for my money these days…
1 Like
They can travel and run at a rate of knots when they want.
I kept tortoises as a kid and many a time I’d turn my back for 5 minutes, after they hadn’t moved for a good half hour just sat munching a lettuce leaf on the lawn … and when you next looked they’d vanished.
2 Likes
Never had one but love them know smart , recognize owners .
What type/s did you have ?
Here we have Florida box turtles which love but illegal to take them from wild yet you see them squished on roads all the time as they flee bulldozers tearing up their environments .
1 Like
You know I have no idea.
When I was a kid you could just go into any pet shop and buy one. I’m not sure it’s that easy anymore with regulations for this and for that.
Lovely pets for an idle kid though … which I was.
The garden was full of newts . I used to love them. I bet they dreaded it when I came galloping into the garden to play with them.
One day I captured a load of them and imprisoned them in the old greenhouse so they could live their in comfort in a box I kitted out with water and sand and rocks.
You can stop laughing now … yes, by next morning they’d all escaped. What a surprise.
I went back to playing with my brothers Action Man toys.
2 Likes
How true at one time in the USA you could buy anything at pet stores but it changed roughly early 80’s I recall but in the UK you could still buy exotics I think till 90’s .
Now regulated here and there .
Leopard tortoises like the one in the article and Greek tortoises were the most popular by you , you can still buy leopards but no longer Greeks .
Love newts but as you know they are not nearly as plentiful now as the past .
The stunning fire salamander from France which is in the newt family though called Salamandra salamandra used to cost roughly 5 dollars in the 70’s and sold all over now about 100 dollars by you and here .
There are pockets of UK with this living work of art and probably non native which found areas to breed / live have you ever seen any ?
1 Like