The tortoises are very cute, but they are sort of like slow goats. And, since they look a lot like cobblestones, and cobblestones are the most prevalent lith in our gardens in San Diego, it's hard to keep track of them when they are making their slow march toward the flowers. I mean it's not like a yellow dog heading for grass to lie down. Your periphal vision just isn't going to pick up another rocklike thing or send messages to your brain that say, "Oh No, there goes the Rose Bush!" Day lilies have suffered the worst in our garden because of the tunneling that tortoises do, and also because they will eat them down to a nubbin.
The full name of these little fellows is California Gopher Tortoise. They dig! They can't be stopped from this tunneling instinct with anything less than a cement floored enclosure. Who, in a hotter climate like ours, want's to live on cement? Our solution is to build little walls that make it very unpleasant for them to try to scale them. If tortoises fall on their backs enough times they finally will get the message. Days may go by until they get the message, but hunger drives them to eat the weeds which is what they should have been eating in the first place. Two years in a row the day lilies didn't make it to blooming. Then we built them a wall of their own. I think they are lovely little things.
The lilies are lovely. I didn't realize that tortoises could be so voracious!
ReplyDeleteShortly after the picture was taken, the female, who is now quite large scaled the wall and ate the little day lilies. All day lilies are going into a pot next year. That's it for me. As to torts, let them eat weeds.
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