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STRICTLY PERSONAL

FOR THE benefit of those
few gentle souls who are
interested in such things, and
in response to some very
“helpful letters from readers,
Tam happy to report some
progress in.the Hunter
household. on the animal- -
_relations front. | i

:. First, the turtles, Some time ago
i mentioned the difficulties [-

“expected to encounter:if f was to try

to follow through on the idea of,
releasing our two captive red slider
turtles... ws
- My wife had bought them at the
» peak of the Teenage Ninja Turtle
/ mania to solace our children for.,
giving our German Shepherd away.
“We loved the dog, but’ my wife
had proved allergic-to her, and so.
Wwe fodnd her.a home’ with some

... friends. who had a lonely bachelor

“dog of the, same breed.
“cL. The two tiny: turtles my wife

vo bought as-an alternative,.along with

‘atiny goldfish. -bowl'and a couple of
‘tiny, packs of food described as'a
“complete turtle kit,” proved to be
somewhat more than she'd bar-
‘gained for. That is to say, they
grew, and grew, and grew...
Today, a couple of years later, :
they livein a 100-zallon water tank
with a 75-gallon tank containing
‘sand and rock below so they can»
take turns basking under a lamp.

“.». The top tank has to be cleaned »
“every t three weeks, a task that takes
‘two of us a couple of hours of \
grinding drudgery. | :

relations front h

Now that we are all in agrees
ment on the foolishness of my
wite’s spontaneous decision to give
in to our daughter's “oohs” and
“ahs” at the sight of the cute little
turtles. —- which are now, in the
case of the big one. 10 inches long.
aad still growing — there is further
agreement that the turtles “should
be released.”

Alas, because of fears of the
spread of salmonella. the traftic in
red-eared sliders across the Canada-
U.S. border has been halted,

You can’t import them fron
Florida or Mexico anymore, and,
more to the point, you can'texport
them — except through one organi-
gation which can only promise to
ship them to an American turtle

“farm,

They can’t be released locally
because they'd devour the weaker
indigenous turtles.

Un the summer we have a turtle
run for the creatures, where they get
to crawl back and forth the length
of the suburban fot. and we also
made the discovery that they love
to swim in the pool.

The chlorine doesn’t bother
then. (Although | only let them

‘stay in an hour or so at the maxi-

mum, just to be’sure. They always
hate to be dragged out.)

With the coming of- winter, and
their confinement to their indoor
tanks, we could tell the tures were
unhappy.

One afternoon, while cleaning
the tank, I felt too harried to place
them in tubs while.the cleaning was
being done, and left them on the
floor.

Ina flash, they took off, Turtles
can move when they want to, One
moment they were in the kitchen,

; then the living room, then the front

hall, wheeling around like tourists
rather than tortoises.

This led to the realization that
they loved wandering around the
house. As long its the basement
door stayed closed, they were. fine.

We've all grown used to keep-
ing an eve on the floor when walk-
ing around, so as not to step on our
shell-backed friends.

As for the turtles, they’ve found
a number of favorite hiding spots,
such as behind the stereo speakers
or under the sofa, where you have
to thove several pieces of furniture
in order to catch them and return
them to their tank at night.

Normally, you don’t expect to

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ger much reaction out of turtles,
except for then cither pulling their
heads in or thrusting them out.
They might ato open and close
their mouths and blink. but that’s
about it.

These two bive now taken ta
showing something that aliiast
verges on affection. We still don't
recommend anybody handle them,
except to lift them in and out of the
lank, but they follow us around,

Their favorite spot is right
around my wife's feet as she's
making supper, or between the
fridge and table where the most
human traffic is.

So — the turtles are happier, if
not wilder, And, to the extent that
having something like a rigid hatl-
inflated football clunking around
the floor behind you can make you
happy, so are we.

Bul sll nagging us was the
plight of our bachelor budgie -—~
another of my wife’s spontancous
acquisitions in response fo the
“oohs” and “ahs” of our daughter.
(Guess who's running the show,
hmm?) >

One day | decided, arbitrarily,
that even though it meant support-
ing the trade in exotic birds (which
bas a dark underbelly that is enough
to make one shudder), the poor
lonely budgie. since we couldn't let
him foose without his dying, ought
to at least have a mate.

Alas. by then, he'd picked up
scaly disease, and we couldn't
bring another budgie in until he was
cured.

Curing him involved one of us
holding him while he tried to bite

“our fingers off and the other one

dabbing around his beak and eyes
with ointment. .
Much squawking and feathers
flying and cursing...
Each time he'd get to the point
where he appeared to be free of the
disease, we'd case off on the treat-

‘Beautiful
sofas,
_loveseats,
chairs,
recliners,

_ bedroom
suites, dining
room
groups,
curios, wall
systems,
desks, tables
etc. etc.

fou Wednesday.

Blanes abruptly, please call Vi Davis at

ments, which were a pain all
around, and, sure enough, it would
come back. We took to calling him
“Fester” after our fivorite Addams
amily chiracter.

Thus, it took nearly halla year
before the big moment when |
brought a gorgeous young lady
budgie home.

Ah, romance among the birds! ht
so happens my 15-year-old son is
going through the experience of his
First Love. The parallels between
his situation and tha of Fester and
his captive bride are frankly awe-
some, Stty tuned.

The Perfect RSP invesiment! ‘

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