Desert tortoises

My husband and I and our two children moved to Ridgecrest in February. We spent the rest of February, and most of March, and most of April, and most of May getting settled. It is now Memorial Day and we are still not settled. Anyway, we missed spring, and it turns out that spring is a very important time in the desert. We never really got out to look at the wildflowers and today I realized that we also missed the best time to look at desert tortoises. It is getting too hot. Soon they will estivate. Soon the Desert Tortoise Natural Area will be unstaffed.

We visited the DTNA today and it was very nice, but there wasn't a tortoise anywhere. We walked for miles, pushing the babies in their hiking stroller, and there were no tortoises. Once in a while we saw a lizard. All the bushes and other plants appeared to be dead (or perhaps estivating -- what the heck does that word mean? OK, I looked it up. According to my dictionary it means "to pass the summer in a torpid condition." And torpid means, variously, "inactive, sluggish, slow, dull, apathetic, lethargic, dormant." In other words, I am going to be estivating this summer too, just like the tortoises...).

We did see one tortoise today, because we started our trip by going to Jawbone Station for a map, and there we got to meet Mr. Bob, who is 110 years old. Yesterday we stopped at Jawbone to see him (I had read about him), but he had already gone to bed (it was about 4pm). So we were pretty pleased with ourselves to be able to see him this morning. The babies were parked in their stroller, which was parked right in front of his enclosure, facing his hole. And suddenly, at about 10:10 am, up he came for breakfast. The babies made noises, so I think they did notice him, though it's always hard to tell. We watched him eat strawberries and lettuce.

One other bit of tortoise info: yesterday the woman in charge of Jawbone told us that she has several rescue tortoises in her backyard and is looking for someone to take over some of them. We determined quickly that we aren't the best choice right now, but maybe in the future!

So, all things considered, a good day. Points in Ridgecrest's favor: (1) near a place that has a visit-able desert tortoise for a mascot; (2) near a tortoise reserve where you can theoretically see desert tortoises if you go at the right time, and at least you know that there are tortoises around even if you can't see them; (3) opportunities exist to have rescue desert tortoises in your backyard! Points not in Ridgecrest's favor: the usual, including cockroaches.