Rock Stars of Red Rock Canyon – Tortoise Updates

One of the most popular volunteer positions – and visitor attractions – at Red Rock Canyon is the Desert Tortoise Habitat, home of the nine resident Rock Stars. The habitat, established in 1995, has provided education and entertainment to well over a million visitors.

Friends of Red Rock Canyon provides the funding to support the “Kids” in the habitat, ranging from the blue booties to the delicious and nutritious Tort Chow. We also pay for annual medical exams to keep the kids healthy.

The kids are fed on Wednesday and Saturday mornings and enjoy Spa Day on Monday. We’d suggest you come close to 8 a.m. if you’d like to watch the kids enjoy breakfast or spa treatment. They tend to head back into their burrows early to avoid the summer heat. What is Spa Day? Each tort has a designated soaking bin that we fill with a few inches of water. The biweekly soaking helps keep the torts hydrated plus they really seem to enjoy it.

Visitor Center Tort Display

There is a fabulous new display at the Visitor Center featuring the Red Rock Tortoises!!It has info about each tort, photos of the volunteers in action and explains in a fun way about tortoise activities, needs and care.

We’ll also be updating it as each tortoise emerges. Pat Williams and Sue Kolar put it together and Friends of Red Rock Canyon provided the funds. It will be up until the end of April, be sure to check it out!

Rosie update

We are very sad to report that Rosie, one of our newest Rock Stars, was euthanized following some serious health issues.

Rosie joined the Red Rock family in July 2017 and was found to have a very large bladder stone in late September. Friend’s wonderful veterinarian, Dr. Lee, recommended that the stone be removed after the first of the year.

Click here to see her x-rays.

Rosie had surgery to remove the bladder stone in early January and seemed to be recovering nicely. She then went into decline and, in spite of the remarkable efforts of Dr. Lee to keep her going (including a feeding tube), she just wasn’t healthy enough to survive. The autopsy revealed that Rosie had a pre-existing liver condition which was likely the primary cause of her rapid decline.

This sad event reinforces our mission of providing annual health check-ups for all of the Rock Stars. Our education efforts will continue to stress that the desert tortoises will live longer lives with proactive medical care.

Sadly, Rosie’s medical costs have almost wiped out our medical account.

You can help us by making a tax-deductible donation to the Tort Medical Fund.

Tort Medical Fund donation

You may process your donation using Paypal by clicking here:

 

Or mail your donation of cash or check payable to Friends of Red Rock Canyon to:

Friends of Red Rock Canyon
1000 Scenic Drive
Las Vegas, NV  89161

Please include a note that the donation is for the Tort Medical Fund.

Upcoming feeding and spa schedule