We don’t have a normal array of pets. We have a horse (if you can call a horse a pet; at any rate, he doesn’t live with us), and we have two turtles, Poirot and Marple. We don’t know their sexes, so they’re not M. Poirot and Miss Marple, just Poirot and Marple.
We do know their species: red-eared sliders, originating along the Mississippi and in the American south, the most common kind of pet store turtle. I did some Internet research after we got them and, had I realized beforehand what I was in for, I probably would have nixed the idea. But we have them now, and I’m responsible for keeping them alive so, unlike the 99.9% of baby red-eared sliders sold worldwide, these two are still thriving after three years. They’re about five inches long now, and they have every chance of living their allotted one score and ten years, and reaching over 14″ in length. By which time, we had better be living in a house with a garden so we can keep them outdoors in a pond most of the year.
For now, they live in a glass tank with a plastic island they can crawl up on, to bask in the rays of their special ultra-violet turtle lamp. And, when it’s warm, we let them have the crawl of the house for exercise and to dry off for a bit (something this species needs to do).
