Treasured Tortoise Returns From Far-Flung Odyssey

By GABRIELLA BOCK | Reporter 

Middle-school-reptile-turned-escape-artist “Bubba” the tortoise had quite the adventure last weekend.

On Thursday, Oct. 26, the 30-year-old African spurred tortoise occupying the farm at Paul Revere Charter Middle School was reported missing from her habitat after a witness spotted an unknown individual forcing the 140-pound tortoise into a van parked on Sunset Boulevard.

Also known as “Fatty Fatty Two By Four,” the audacious herbivore is believed to have escaped Thursday morning after she pushed open the gate to her enclosure and walked 300 yards to a parking lot near the school’s tennis courts.

It was there that Bubba crossed paths with the alleged pet napper, who then drove the tortoise some 30 miles to the Debell Golf Club in Burbank, abandoning her on the green where she was later found wandering near the 18th hole.

Scott Scozzola, Debell’s general manager, told the Palisadian-Post that he and staff called Burbank Animal Control to remove the tortoise from their course, a feat that took four men to complete.

Reputed for having an agreeable temperament, the African spurred tortoise—also called the sulcata tortoise—is the largest species of mainland tortoise and has an average lifespan of 50 to 150 years.

Rescued three years ago by Paul Revere science teacher Craig Honda, Bubba has been an adored member of the campus farm where agriculture students learn how to grow their own food and tend to an array of animals such as chickens, goats and rabbits.

By Thursday evening, word of Bubba’s disappearance spread around the community as sorrowed school faculty and students began calling for the safe return of their shelled darling.

Local media agency KTLA even got word of the missing tortoise and covered the story on their 6 and 10 p.m. Thursday night news segments.

Much to the delight of her Paul Revere family, the news traveled fast and Bubba was recovered from the Burbank Animal Shelter Sunday morning after a volunteer recognized the headlining tortoise from their television screen.

On Monday, Oct. 30, after a long, exhausting journey across LA County,  Honda reported to the Palisadian-Post that Bubba was happy back at home on the Paul Revere farm.