Page 5 - Winter 2013 magazine 2 layout

By Roger and Sue Kolar

It is winter and the tortoises are brumating, the reptile equiva-
lent of hibernation. Six of the females are huddled together in
one burrow and the other two females are each in their own
burrow. The volunteers don't need to feed or water the tortoises
for the next few months, but there are always visitors to talk to
and trash to be picked up.

It has been a very busy year in the habitat, so let's recap the
highlights.

Six of the girls snuggled in for their winter’s nap
Photo by S. Kolar
Betty woke up February 11, a month earlier than the previous

year. The females emerged slowly, with Maxine keeping several
tortoises blocked behind her inside a burrow until the middle of
March. Mojave Max, the tortoise equivalent of a teenage boy,
slept in and didn’t emerge until April 17, a new record for the
latest emergence. He didn't eat his first meal of the year until
May 9 – he was not ready to wake up. In June, Maxine laid 16
eggs, another Red Rock Canyon record. No wonder she didn't

want to come out of the burrow.
Betty greeting the new tortoise season
Photo by S. Kolar
The Tort Team spent much of the summer anticipating the arri-
val of a new male tortoise. The Bureau of Land Management
(BLM) built a new habitat with an incredibly large burrow.

The volunteers talked about how enormous the new tortoise
must be and proposed various schemes for counting out his
kibbles and soaking him. Finally on September 6, the new un-
named tortoise arrived and lived up to his big reputation. He
weighed almost 32 pounds, twice as much as Maxine. We had
a naming contest and, by popular vote, he is now called Hugo,

which can be pronounced Huge-O. He is very friendly and al-
The Big Guy outside his burrow ready popular with the volunteers and the visitors.
Photo by S. Kolar (Continued on page 14)
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