Casper has discovered the fish.
And the fish are surely aware of him. They’re huddled up against the wall of the pot, motionless, where he can’t see them.
I like having both the fish and the snails in there, but I can see it’s definitely going to mean more maintenance on my part. Going to need to scoop gunk off the bottom more often, and remove plant overgrowth. However, everyone likes looking at the fish, cats and people. I’m happy with the tradeoff.
Went outside for the first time in a couple of weeks. I’d been trying to take Casper out for a while every morning. It’s usually cool enough to be nice for a couple of hours in the morning. But it’s heated up and gotten really humid for the past couple of weeks so I haven’t gone out. Casper’s been mad at me. He loves his morning out in the garden. As do I. So this morning we sat outside and enjoyed the butterfly parade. Casper enjoyed my orchids.
I got some new fish for the pond recently. I’ve had one for several years and think she’s been lonely, judging by the eggs she’s been laying. I had one fish for a long time before. I bought several at once and then all of them died but the one. This time I decided I quarantine them for a couple of days before I put them in the pond. This time everyone seems to be doing OK. I named them before I got them home; I don’t know why. Blanche, Lucy and Coppertop. I’ve had the other fish for 3 years and never called it anything but fish. At first the newcomers hid from Fish. No wonder, she’s 3 times the size of the others. But as of now they’re schooling around the pot, acting like fish. So far so good.
The atrium has been Casper’s new favorite spot. He plays, he prowls, he pounces. He’s my lion in a 8 foot jungle.
He loves it because it’s outdoors, with breezes and sunshine, but it’s also away from people and delivery trucks because he’s terrified of them. He’s a big, hairy chicken.
Casper always finds the biggest pile of dirt to roll in.
Casper likes to play on the stairs. I think he likes being on the same level.
The mammalian members, anyway. Spud’s big enough now that he makes rather an uncomfortable lap sitter. Not to mention he’ll bite anything that he likes the look or smell of, and his beak is sharp!
Can anyone tell that I love our cats? They each have their own chair on the patio, good for keeping cat tails out of tortoise range, and they lounge on the patio with us when we go out in the evening. No free range cats here. Between cars and coyotes, outdoor cats don’t last long in Southern California. Fortunately for us, our patio is enclosed all around.
This is Spud. Spud is a captive bred red-footed tortoise. I got him when he was the size of a chicken egg. He’s now about 15 inches long and about 13 pounds. He is also a jerk. If I’m doing anything in the yard he likes to come and see, usually by walking up behind me and tripping me.
The cats have also learned to be wary of him. He’ll walk up to them and try to take a bite. They say tortoises are vegetarian and while I’m sure that’s the majority of their diet, what they really are is opportunists. I know for a fact that they’ll eat carrion, not to mention cat tails and unguarded toes. Spud is big enough and strong enough to wedge open the sliding glass door to the kitchen to get to one of his favorite foods, cat food. If any of the doors are left open he will sneak in a make a bee-line for the cat food.
Having a tortoise is a little like having a very small tank around. He wanders the patio searching for anything edible and he mows down anything that gets in his way. It often seems like he takes the hard way around. He’ll turn on his side to scrape through spaces I would have thought were much too small for him. I guess when live on stuff that you find on the ground it’s to your benefit to look everywhere. While this behavior is a plus in terms of tortoise survival, in terms of my yard it means knocked over tools and pots and plants that have mowed over in the endless search for food.
Blog of a geek with a garden 