animal communicators Out of the desert Meet Tito the tortoise!

and has lived with Phil and Margie Schilke five years.

By Karen Walenga

Only in Arizona can you share your yard, home and heart with a personable Sonoran Desert Tortoise.

Just ask Green Valley residents Phil and Margie Schilke, who adopted Tito — their 13-year-old tortoise — close to five years ago from a licensed breeder.

“He is so intelligent,” Phil says, pointing out that Tito likes to play with balls, enjoys neck rubs and being petted on his back with their fingernails. He also loves to explore and is a bit of an escape artist.

Margie agrees that Tito can be somewhat stealthy and adventurous, watching and figuring out how to open the backyard screen door by himself.

“If only we could get him to close it and keep the flies out,” Phil says.

Tito certainly is a constant source of amazement for the couple. He is curious, pretty low maintenance, and gets along with dogs, but not so much with the couple’s gardener.

“They do have a personality, likes and dislikes,” Phil says. “He loves neck rubs, but not from strangers.”

Tito often spent much time in the backyard with the couple, but last October decided to move into the house for his winter Brumation sleep and stayed there until mid-April.

“At this moment, he prefers to be inside with us rather than outside. We take him outside every day at 3 p.m., let him start moving around and feed him a plate of kale followed by a single cut-up strawberry for a treat — his favorite,” Phil says.

While wild tortoises dine on desert weeds and grasses, cactus blossoms if reachable and the fallen cactus fruit in the fall, a captive tortoise has a more varied diet. Commercial tortoise food is available, and suitable grocery store veggies include spinach leaves, watermelon and avocado. But be sure to avoid all types of lettuce.

“Your tortoise will tell you what treats it likes. Tito does not like spinach and watermelon, for example,” Phil notes.

“Folks say they do not have a personality, but this is simply not true. Tito shows affection by kissing our ankles when he ambles around. He does not like thunder and will seek out Margie and nestle his shell against her foot for comfort. He also likes to join us in the kitchen during dinner prep, parking on his shell by the dishwasher with neck and head extended, just watching the movement.”

In their travels with Tito, the Shilkes keep him in Arizona, as required by the state. On a recent vacation in Flagstaff, Tito remembered the campground they'd stayed in two years earlier.

“They have a very good short-term, as well as long-term, memory,” Phil points out. KAREN WALENGA PHOTO PHIL AND MARGIE in their Green Valley backyard with Tito.

KAREN WALENGA PHOTO TITO AND PHIL relax at home in Green Valley on a hot summer afternoon.

Tito is the couple's first Sonoran Desert Tortoise, however Phil recalls when, in 1954, his military father and the family were transferred to an Air Force base in the Mojave Desert.

“I was allowed to roam the desert on my own … and I found a very small, very young Mojave Desert Tortoise, which is a related species to the Sonoran Tortoise. I had this little tortoise for three and a half years. Named him Fred after our next-door neighbor at the time, Capt. Fred Whipple, the meteorologist for the Air Force base.”

When his family was transferred again, Phil took Fred back into the desert exactly where he found him.

“Knowing what I know now, his name should have been Fredrica. Yep, it was a female. It is also possible she is still alive today, some 66 years later,” he notes.

Phil also has given a presentation in Green Valley on Desert Tortoises as part of a class through the OLLI-UA Osher Lifelong Learning Institute. His goal: for each of the 35 attendees to leave the class with more knowledge of and an increased appreciation for these wonderful creatures. And maybe one or two might start the adoption process for their own Sonoran Desert Tortoise.

Attendees learned about Arizona laws on the Sonoran Desert Tortoise; how to distinguish a male from a female; tortoise mating and egg laying; care of hatchlings; a sort of hibernation called Brumation; their life span and more.

Fact is that Sonoran Desert Tortoises are solitary animals. Two males together in a yard will fight. Two females will ignore each other. It's illegal to have a male and female unless you're licensed to breed, and few if any more licenses are issued by Arizona Game and Fish, he notes.

KAREN WALENGA PHOTO TITO TUCKS INTO A MEAL of kale, one of his favorites.