A 100-year-old pet tortoise has been successfully reunited with his family after he was found in distress in a Louisiana canal.
The African spurred tortoise, named Biscuit, was found on Aug. 30 after an animal control team was called about a tortoise in distress in the New River Canal in Ascension Parish just southwest of Baton Rouge,
According to a Facebook post from the Ascension Parish government, animal control officers worked with the sheriff's office to retrieve Biscuit from the canal. He was then loaded into a truck and taken to Cara's House, an animal shelter in Sorrento, a town in Ascension Parish.
Cara's House posted pictures and video of Biscuit being reunited with his family the same day he was found, including the tortoise sauntering through the parking lot to his family's truck.
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Biscuit is an African spurred tortoise, also called a sulcata tortoise, and is one of the largest tortoise species in the world, growing up to 30 inches long and weighing up to 200 pounds, according to the San Diego Zoo.
"They are curious, intelligent reptiles with lively personalities, especially when young," the zoo says.
The species is also one of the longest-living that can be kept as pets, with a life span ranging from 80 and 100 years old, the zoo says.
Listed as endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, the group estimated that there were only about 400 left in the wild as of 2020, according to the Dublin Zoo.
The tortoise is bred and sold throughout the U.S. and has become a popular pet, though some families get overwhelmed when they get extremely large, the San Diego Zoo says.
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Sulcata tortoises do not swim and can drown easily, according to MedVet. They should be kept dry.
If kept as a pet, the species need a shallow water bowl, but access to the water should not be any deeper than the tortoise's bridge, the section of its body where the top and bottom shell meet.
They should not be kept indoors because of the amount of space they need. Rather, they should be given a dry, heating housing unit in the outdoors that they can use at night and during inclement weather, MedVet says.
