Desert Tortoise Week starts October with a Steady Crawl of Tortoise Events
They can be so elusive that even some longtime locals haven’t seen one in the wild - nevertheless the desert tortoise endures as one of the most iconic native species in the Mojave Desert. The slow-but sturdy desert tortoise can live up to 95% of their lives in burrows underground - sheltering from the hot sun in the daytime and keeping warm when the temperature drops during winter. The desert tortoise is California’s state reptile and has been on earth an estimated 15 to 20 million years -…