Slowpoke

Diego, the giant Galapagos tortoise whose tireless efforts are credited with almost single-handedly saving his once-threatened species, is retiring. The 100-year old tortoise fathered 800 hatchlings during his time on Santa Cruz, but is now returning home to his native island of Española after having taken part in a breeding program since the nineteen-sixties…

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Tortoises are looked upon by their cousins, the turtles, as the boring, stuffy members of the family. They do not swim. They walk at a snail’s pace. They eat lettuce.

There has never been a teenage mutant ninja tortoise.

But then, no turtle has ever saved his whole species from extinction.

We should start by bemoaning the fact that chelonians’ attitude to male/female roles seem to match ours. Diego is regarded as a legend, a hero, saviour of his species, simply because he has spent a lifetime laying. The lady tortoises, the ones who then did the further, more difficult, laying, do not seem to get any credit, although they probably also reared the children, swept the island, and have made sure that Diego is going to get eight hundred Father’s Day cards tomorrow.

Still, he has given fifty years of devoted service, so to speak, and it would seem churlish not to acknowledge his, well, efforts.

There will be those who envy Diego his job. Such people have not thought this through, and have never listened to the tales of couples Trying For A Baby, when the whole thing becomes a chore and all the fun goes out of it.

Imagine Trying For A Baby every single day.

There is an Irish phrase, ‘an rud is annamh is aontach’, which translates as ‘what’s seldom is wonderful’. Diego felt sometimes as if it were written especially for him. Some days he simply wouldn’t feel up to it, and would hide in his shell, looking like a Volkswagen Beetle up on blocks.

But he was a consummate (dear God) professional, and would always eventually drag himself out to work.

And now he is retiring, having reached a hundred years of age. His neck is wrinkled, his face lined, so he hasn’t changed much since the day he arrived.

He is knock-kneed now, but in fairness, so would you be.