Dear Members and Friends: Our Summer meeting will be held on Saturday, July 11th at the Robbie Waters library, 7335 Gloria Drive (also on Havenside). Plan to arrive around 4 pm and prepare to stay for several hours. The Summer meetings are always relaxed and fun; the weather is warm and our pets are eating instead of on strike, active instead of sluggish and a joy to observe every day. Feel free to bring your favorites for Show and Tell and remember, please do not let them walk on the floor. The pets are to be in boxes at all time. The floor must be kept germ free!!! (Toddlers are the next group to use the room and that is the reason for all of this anxiety! You wouldn't want your baby crawling around on a floor which a tortoise had previously made a mess on). We can admire your pet even if he or she is in a box. After the meeting, you are welcome to let it walk around outside of the library room. We will have plants to exchange which seems to be quite popular and feel free to join in. We can never have enough. I hope to have some really nice cactus potted up and ready to go. You can see from the flyer below that we have a really cool new place to hold our TURTLERAMA! It's in the parking lot in front of the new INCREDIBLE PETS!! 392 Florin Road. Date is August 22 from 11-4. I took Corrine Mason into the store several weeks ago and upon coming out, I noticed the wide sidewalk which was shady and it was like a lightening bolt hit me - what a great venue for our show! I contacted the owner of Incredible Pets and she did some investigating and there are no restrictions or barriers. WE ARE GOOD TO GO FOR THE SHOW!!! I did purchase two canopies if anyone wants to borrow them. There's plenty of parking. ACE hardware is right next door and on the other side is ROUND TABLE PIZZA!!! Manley's Donut shop is in the shopping center as is Taco Bell; a Japanese restaurant (Edocco's I think?); and a small family restaurant. So the setting is perfect. Please bring your own table and chairs. Let me know if you need to borrow a table? And we can all get together and help one another. We CAN get water from the sink in Incredible Pets. Overall, I think it will be a wonderful experience for us all. And nobody will be screaming at us. Peace at last!!! We will have our sale table - there are no restrictions........we can talk more at the meeting and PLEASE sign up so I will know who will be exhibiting and/or helping out that day. If you can't make the meeting, then email me your plans. It will be a terrific day, you'll see!! SEE YOU ALL AT THE MEETING!! Once Again - SUMMER HINTS: Water Water Water, even in the midst of our historic drought, make sure all of your pets (2 and 4 legged) have access to clean fresh water at all times and if they sit in one place all day, just plunk them in for awhile. It's 104 outside right now and I've been hosing down those who are quite inactive just to make sure they don't dehydrate.Keep an eye on the ground for little white rocks; bermuda grass which they get tangled in; fox tails which somehow get into their eyes, needles, pins, nails, screws, pet fur, bits of string and yarn, plastic bags, thread and even long hair. I know it is difficult to keep one step ahead of our pets but we have to in order to keep them safe. Watch that the water in the wading pools does not get too hot. Move to partial shade on really hot days. Set timers to remind you to check often. AT THE BUNKER The Bunker is more like a zoo right now. I've never had this many extra turtles and tortoises to care for before in the tortoise hotel. It's really hard to keep up when the weather is so hot and I have no way of keeping the vegetables fresh for longer than a day or two. I wish I had room for a vegetable garden. I did buy a 'raised garden bed' from Walmart on line and Corrine came by to help me set it up, however, I realized there really is no place to put it. So it is simply sitting in the middle of the lawn. The 3 huge bags of dirt to fill it with are on my cart on the side of the yard and as of now, there are some Greek tortoises and box turtles enjoying the square which is now the hotel annex!! And my baby tortoises have to stay in their cages awhile longer. That's life At The Bunker. Two new baby sliders were just delivered as I was sitting here typing! Not sure where they were found but I don't ask questions. I just take in the homeless with a smile. At our Box Turtle Blowout a few weeks ago, during the sale, etc. I was presented with two young desert tortoises, both of whom had been bitten by the family dog. The daughter whom they were staying with while the owners were on vacation, did a good job of sanitizing the wounds and bandaging them up and I was very impressed at how well she did in spite of being in a huge panic. The biggest danger are flies getting into the wounds. So I kept the two inside of my screened patio room for several weeks and inspected the wounds after about 9 days. They still didn't look too good (or bad) so I applied the veterinary powder I like to use and the tortoises continued to eat and act normally and last week, they looked so well healed that I let them play outside. The owner will be taking them home soon and they won't be near the dog who did not like them at all and used them as chew toys. Always be cautious, my friends. It can happen in the blink of an eye, even if the tortoise and dog have been together for a long time. I've seen it many times. The worst injuries occur when when nobody is home to stop the attack. The Greek tortoise who lost a foot to a chihuahua and had a badly damaged plastron as well did heal and is now in a safer home where he will never be harmed again................ The broken branch is still hanging off of the huge lemon tree but the edge of it is resting on the ground so I'm leaving it alone since there is no danger of it falling right now, but most important is the fact that there are about a dozen box turtle nests in the area and I certainly do not want a work crew in there with ladders stomping around and compacting the dirt so the hatchlings would have no way of emerging after the first rain. Thanks to all who want to help, but it's just not the right time and I will let you know when it is safe to bring your chain saws!! Stop yelling at me because I don't want you to help. I DO want help, but at the right time!! MOTHER KNOWS BEST!!! THANKS EVERYONE FOR HANGING IN THERE WITH ME! The club keeps growing and growing. I APPRECIATE YOUR CONTINUED SUPPORT. (Oh, there was no incident to report from the last meeting, except for one I can't put into print........ Can anyone guess what it was and who did it????? ) Thanks for all of the yummy food you bring to the meetings!!! See you soon!!! Enjoy the Summer!! I LOVE IT. Hope this newsletter arrives in good shape!