We have a new family member, a yellow-bellied slider turtle adopted through the Mid-Atlantic Turtle and Tortoise Society.  Believe it or not, reptiles are abandoned by their owners, it's not just cats and dogs (and guinea pigs).  The lady who fostered Charlie for a week after picking him up from Baltimore where he'd lived for a year after being rescued told me of a turtle she had just taken to a new home whose aquarium had been put out in the trash with the turtle still in it.  Charlie and his new aquarium resides in Micah's room, and Micah is thrilled.

Getting the aquarium, getting it set up, getting the pump assembled getting the very large, very heavy coffee table out of the garage and upsairs, and all the other stuff was a series of misadventures.  The pump had missing tubing and had to be returned.  Steve actually read the back of the label of the aquarium and found it was not to be filled with water. Huh?  I made mention of the fact that the tank was going to be used for an aquatic turtle when I was buying the supplies at Petsmart - and the salesperson working with me has turtles as pets.  Turtles need UVA and UVB lights to keep their shells strong, and the lights remain on for twelve hours per day.  The day I had arranged to drive to Plymouth Meeting, Pennsylvania to pick him up, it snowed all morning making the Turnpike 80 miles of slushy torture.  I didn't want to open the box with Charlie until I picked up Micah, so we got him home, opened the box and what was described as a six-inch turtle was was more like nine or ten inches, depending on how the shell is measured.  And we only had a few minutes to put him in his tank and keep on moving to Micah's appointment with Dr. Choe.

So the larger than anticipated turtle needed a bigger basking shelf - another trip to Petsmart, and the lady from MATTS said he would have some of his familiar tank plants with him.  Didn't happen.  Cha-ching, cha-ching, cha-ching.  I hope the bulk of the upfront costs are finished.

Meanwhile on Monday I bought some guppies for Charlie.  Fast food, food that is highly motivated to be fast, they swim as if their lives depend on it.  When the five went into Charlie's tank, he shot off his basking shelf and got himself one, and then another.   And I thought one more went into his stomach, but it was doing a better job hiding than the other two who have banded together for survival.  After I put in the feeding stone for the surviving guppies, Charlie decided to hover over it waiting for them. . . .

Micah loves him, he doesn't shed and he's quiet.