Dear Members and Friends, Our SUMMER meeting will be held on Saturday, July 15th at the Belle Cooledge Library. I have the meeting room from 5-10 pm (nobody can have the 'public' meeting room before five unless it is a library event). We can do what we did for the last meeting in April. We can meet in the park next to the library starting around 3 pm and talk and enjoy each other and our pets and then at 5, those who want to attend the meeting can go into the library room and others can leave or stay awhile. It's up to you and this is the best I can do. We had a nice group gathering last time and I expect it will be even better this time. Please place pets in containers inside of the library room. We don't want to leave anything smelly & icky on the floor.............. I haven't heard much about the status of the McKinley Park Pond. The turtles were given to anyone who came to the door of the Front Street Animal Shelter. The Land Park ponds have not ben re-filled because there is some sort of problem there but I did see on the news that the McKinley pond renovation was complete. I think little by little people will be dropping off their turtles.....and it will become a safe haven for the turtles once again and a place of enjoyment for the children. As you notice below, we will be having our TURTLERAMA in the parking lot again because just about everyone likes it there. The only problem last year was the intense heat, I believe it was 104 with no breeze blowing at all which made it feel more like 110!. Incredible Pets is open for us to cool off in. Personally I can't complain about the heat because I spend each winter complaining about how cold I am.....it was a dreadfully chilly winter for Sacramento. And a little too wet????? Steve and Tracy will be bringing Ben, their giant Sulcata, to the Turtlerama and his corral and hay and we'll have a small Sulcata there as well to show the public what to expect in the future if they buy a baby Sulcata. I'll have the sign up sheet for the show at the meeting and if you can't be there, PLEASE let me know if you are going to be displaying your turtles or tortoises or helping at the show. I would be happy to help at the Kids Korner. It is shady on the sidewalk by the pet shop all day. Please bring your own table and chairs......we'll make it work again.............THANKS SO MUCH. SEE YOU AT THE SUMMER MEETING     AT THE BUNKER It's a busy place all year long. Due to all of the activity going on daily, I didn't have a chance to have the Box Turtle Blowout and I do have some for adoption/sale not to mention a huge assortment of 'things' you might need including various sized aquariums; Two Tortoise Homes; Huge wooden boxes for keeping tortoises /turtles indoors in during the winter months who are sick or you don't want them to hibernate, etc. and an assortment of lights and pumps and it is making the yard quite a mess so if you need any of these things, just let me know. The Bunker has turned into what looks like a Hoarders Paradise. I've had many nests dug by the box turtles since coming out of hibernation and especially during the recent heat wave but oddly enough, there are no eggs in the holes which are all over the lawn. No tortoises have laid eggs except for Suzie, the Greek, who laid 3 one afternoon.....but two weeks ago she dug an enormous nest and covered it up. I couldn't wait to dig the eggs up. I figured there must be about a dozen or more in the nest. I carefully dug, I dug some more............I dug until I hit the bottom of the nest. Not one egg was laid. ??? Has anyone ever experienced anything like this? It's a first for me. As I said, the box turtles left empty holes in the ground but Suzie covered the whole thing up! Maybe she'll do her job with the next full moon? One of our club members with a beautiful pond took 5 large red ears home about two weeks ago. I had more but she didn't want to overload her pond.......and the other night, here At The Bunker, there was a raid, I'm assuming the rats are back after a blissful winter without them. There are injuries and I'm very unhappy because they cannot be adopted out and cleaning out these ponds every day is a bit too much for anyone to deal with along with everything else, but I take a deep breath and simply do it because the turtles are worth the effort. And it is my fault. I just WISH I had let them go somewhere and not kept them to be sitting ducks for those lousy predators who are so evil praying on innocent turtles who harm nothing. How do you prevent predators? We usualy don't suspect anything until it is too late. The Driveway Patrol is helpful but does not detect rats. I guess they are too low to the ground? If you have a vegetable garden, that will draw them to your yard. Everyone seems to be behaving this season (so far) and I think I solved the problem of the escape route the tortoises created in the back of the yard. I put a bottom under the doghouse I had back there so the tortoises and box turtles now go into the dog house and don't begin madly digging and digging until they come out in my neighbors yard. It's an area which is invisible to humans. Every day it is a struggle to keep them from escaping. My neighbor recently found one of my Russian tortoises in her compost pile and he obviously had been there for quite some time since he was the color of the compost!! Fat Betty and the gang are all doing fine. Everyone has been rather quiet probably due to the extremely hot weather we had. In fact, everyone is quite lazy so far this year. A 'new' Just Jim was turned in and he was so so BAD, assaulting everyone and then the fence blew down. He escaped immediately but was returned two days later by the nice family behind the house next door......and they have a swimming pool but luckily, it is fenced and the children saw him walking along the fence line and told Mom and Dad and they knew where he came from, so he had a safe return and now even he is being very nice to his Bunkermates. I don't understand it but I'm not complaining either. See you soon everyone. Happy Summer!