Tortoise reunited with owner after year

IT WAS a devastating tale many pet owners know all too well – a curious animal who disappears from their backyard, never to be seen again.

But the story of Martin the tortoise has a happy ending.

Nearly a year after the tortoise disappeared from his home in Ontario, Canada, he was found just two blocks away.

Rachelle Green and her husband Daniel Kneblewski thought it was too good to be true when they received a call from the Oakville and Milton Humane Society.

“It kind of shocked me since it had been such a long time,” Green said.

Green had canvassed her neighbourhood with flyers when Martin escaped under the couple’s backyard fence in July 2017 while she was gardening.

As the months went by she lost hope, knowing it would be hard for him to survive in the harsh Canadian winter.

So Green couldn’t believe her luck when a woman from the shelter revealed that someone had turned in a tortoise the same size, sex and breed as Martin.

And Green was only more surprised when she found out that the tortoise had been turned in by a man who was gardening at his home just two blocks down the road.

Green said she “became hysterical” after she received the phone call and immediately drove to the shelter, trying not to get her hopes up.

But when she first saw the tortoise, Green’s heart sank.

He was bigger than she remembered, and there were white marks all over his shell. But further examination proved not all hope was lost.

“I realised the white marks were scars from something trying to make a meal of him,” she said.

And Green remembered Martin had a small birth defect on one of his shell sections.

When she turned him over, she saw the familiar scar – and burst into tears.

Green was crying so hard that she couldn’t get out the words when she called her husband to tell him that Martin was finally back in her arms.

“After 11 months of some sort of adventure that only Martin will ever know, his journey brought him home. If only he could talk!” she said.

Four days after she found Martin once again, Green got a phone call from the very man who had found the tortoise in his backyard.

He said he had taken Martin to the humane society to find out how to care and feed for him, as his son had wanted to keep him. – Daily Mail