Torts

Hello! Welcome to Harpo & Friends!

My name is Kathy and I started out in 1993 with Leopard Tortoises (Geochelone pardalis babcocki). I currently keep a family of four leopards, in addition to one 45 pound African Spurred Tortoise (Geochelone sulcata) named Harpo, who is pictured above.

This picture of Harpo looks like something out of National Geographic, doesn't it? Believe it or not, this was taken right in our back yard here in Maryland! In this picture, Harpo is sitting in front of what we call "The North Hole", which is a burrow he dug himself out on the hill during his first summer here - it measured about 20 feet deep in 2005, and is pictured below.

Harpo also dug what we call "The South Hole" (pictured below), which is about 15 feet away from the North Hole on the same hill. They are about the same depth, but to our knowledge, these holes do not connect.

We don't worry too much about Harpo's digging because he has plenty of room to roam. We are very fortunate in that respect. He lives in our back yard during the summer, which is 2 fenced in acres - and he uses EVERY INCH of it! If we had any less property, chances are Harpo would be digging under the fence - a simple task for a sulcata his size! Its a good thing we didn't have any landscaping in the backyard, because we could have just kissed it goodbye when Harpo came to live with us!

Below is my best attempt at taking a picture of the entire yard to give you an idea of just how much space an adult sulcata requires - this is actually 3 pictures overlapped. Our house is off on the left, and if you follow the chainlink fencing down towards our neighbor on the right, you can see where it stops past the big poplar tree by the white fence. Then if you follow the tree line back to the single tall thin juniper standing alone at the end, thats the back corner. Its hard to see here, but the fence goes up the hill from the back corner, between our neighbor's house and the pool, and back up to the house on the other side. If you look carefully in the middle of the hill, above (or to the left of) the sassafras tree, you can see where Harpo's burrows are:

This is how Harpo looks most of the time - like a big walking dirt clod! Thats ok, because he's happiest when he's dirty, and thats our goal with him - to make him happy! His black mouth comes from eating mulberries...