Our red-eared slider turtle Midori met Gadget, our neighbour's cat, this evening, and it was hilarious watching them interact.
It's been very hot and dry here in the lower mainland of BC, so we've been using dirty water from Midori's tank to water our outdoor plants. I lugged Midori and her tank outside, and my wife Yumi watched Midori as I spread the water around, and took the tank back inside for cleaning and re-filling.
When I got back outside, Yumi whispered to me, "Midori is going down the slope toward Gadget!"
Sure enough, Midori was trundling along the dirt slope beside the concrete stairs, straight toward an extremely interested, focused, and somewhat perplexed, Gadget.
We're animal lovers, however we've never been able to win over Gadget, who is a very aloof cat. In nearly 3 years living here, he's allowed me to touch him only once, and has never come within range of Yumi.
Anyway, as Midori neared Gadget, who was getting increasingly twitchy, I thought I'd better close quarters to referee the encounter.
Midori got within half a meter of Gadget before she noticed a possible predator -- she's been an indoor turtle all her life, and I think her instincts have been blunted. I decided to intervene, and picked Midori up and extended her toward Gadget, who responded by sniffing at her furiously as Midori "went turtle" and retracted all of her extremities.
Gadget was so interested in Midori that he began winding himself between my legs as I held her about a foot off the ground. He even submitted to petting before back-tracking Midori's trail to get another whif.
He came back down to us and did the wind again, so Yumi thought she'd try her chances and came down to join us. Lo and behold, Gadget twined her, too, and allowed Yumi to pet him.
Midori was semi-extended at this point, but as soon as Gadget stuck his nose in her face again, she turtled and disappeared. We figured Midori was getting enough stress for a first encounter, so we broke off the engagement and retired inside to regale ourselves with our observations.
What's going on in the heads of these two animals? You can't read too much in, however Gadget seemed to understand that Midori was "with us," and Midori showed some signs that we'd "back her up" before instinct completely took over.
Gadget I can understand, but what about Midori? Some books say certain species of turtles appear to learn to respond to names and such. Those brains may be the size of peas, but sometimes I find myself wondering if they process more than we humans think they do....
Posted by Paul at July 25, 2004 08:25 PM