BULLHEAD CITY - After a brief winter's nap, the desert tortoise will slowly emerge from his den, scouting for food, looking for a mate, and leisurely enjoying the warm spring sunshine.
“This is tortoise activity season, the time of year when they have emerged from their burrows and can find good vegetation and water,” California Department of Fish and Game Scientist Rebecca Jones said. “This is also the season, usually late May and June when they lay eggs.”
Its bumbling, slow moving, harmless personality, portrayed perfectly in the hare and the tortoise cartoons, has made the dome-shelled reptile very attractive to potential pet owners, placing the ancient denizen in jeopardy.
“People collect them from the desert thinking they would make good pets,” Jones said. “These animals are protected under the California and federal Endangered Species Act, and yet we get up to 40 calls a year from people who say they've found one and asking what they should do with it.”
Arizona and Nevada also have laws to protect the desert tortoise, which is listed as a threatened species with the federal government.
“The desert tortoise cannot be removed from the desert,” Nevada Division of Wildlife Public Information Officer Geoff Schneider said. “It is illegal to collect them, whether dead or alive. You cannot remove empty shells or living tortoises.”
Often people think they are helping the slow-moving tortoise, which can reach up to 15 inches in length and 15 pounds, when they rescue them from dangerous situations, Arizona Game and Fish Department Biologist Steve Goodman said.
“A tortoise in the road is simply trying to get to the other side,” Goodman said. “If a situation is considered hazardous, people can help the tortoise to the other side of the road by holding both sides of its shell and keeping it low to the ground to diminish stress on the animal. Make sure you help it continue in the direction it was heading. Once on the other side, the tortoise will likely continue in that direction.”
It's very important not to scare or stress the animal too much, Goodman said.
Like camels, tortoises store water in a special urinary bladder and reabsorb the water as needed during dry conditions.
When frightened or stressed, the reptiles will relieve themselves, depleting their water store, he said.
“Secondly, there are disease factors to be considered,” Goodman said. “Once a tortoise is handled for a length of time, it can't be returned to the wild.”
Tortoises collected as pets and later returned to the wild are causing problems for native populations.
“Released tortoises have a low survival rate and can spread diseases within the dwindling tortoise populations,” Jones said.
In Arizona, the Adopt-a-Tortoise Program makes every effort to find healthy homes for unwanted pets or those salvaged from development projects or other hazardous situations, Arizona Game and Fish Department Public Information Officer Zen Mocarski said.
The Tort Group, of Nevada, offers similar hope for displaced tortoises, and California has a desert tortoise adoption program.
Those interested in adopting a desert tortoise should realize that caring for them isn't necessarily easy, Mocarski said.
“When a person commits to a cat or dog, it's reasonable to assume most pet owners will outlive their pets,” he said. “When you adopt a tortoise, it's probably a lifetime commitment. In addition, they require free-standing water and their diet is important. Just because they like a particular type of fruit or vegetable, doesn't mean it's good for them.”
The desert tortoise, when left undisturbed, can live up to 100 years and averages more than 60, Mocarski said.
Prior to the 1950s, desert tortoise populations exceeded several hundred tortoises per square mile. Today, most populations contain no more than five to 50 individuals.
“While the illegal take of tortoises remains a concern, scientists attribute elevated mortality rates to numerous causes, including vandalism, upper respiratory tract diseases, off-road vehicles that either crush them or destroy their habitat, trampling by livestock and perdition by common ravens and feral dogs,” Jones said.
Although it hasn't happened in Arizona, the upper respiratory tract disease has been credited with a massive die-off in the western Mojave Desert, Mocarski said.
The disease is not harmful to humans but can be carried on their hands, which is why people need to exercise caution when deciding whether or not to handle a tortoise, he said.
“We just don't know alot about this disease's potential impact in Arizona,” Goodman said. “So when a tortoise remains in contact with people for a prolonged period of time, we can't release it into the wild. And, it would be ideal if these animals remained in the wild, not fenced into a person's backyard.”
While a desert tortoise may not travel more than 2 miles from their natal nest in their whole lives, they need the freedom to roam and construct the ideal burrow, Mocarski said.
Burrows vary by type and magnitude depending on geographic location, and may be used year after year by one or more tortoise, according to CDFG.
Burrows are often passed down from generation to generation and some dens in southern Utah are estimated to be 5,000 years old, according to the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum.
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