The Arizona Game & Fish Department has 150 tortoises in need of families.
They range in age from hatchling to adult and while adoption is free, you need to have a burrow and act fast, because the state can’t let them go once the reptiles go down for a winter nap.
100 hatchlings and 50 adult Sonoran Desert Tortoises are in the care of Arizona Game and Fish.
Tegan Wolf, Desert Tortoise Adoption Program Coordinator, talks about where the animals under their care came from, and more about the natural deadline of brumation and why it means they need to act fast.
Like hibernation in mammals, brumation is a dormant period in which tortoise essentially shut down for a while.
Wolf says the 150 tortoises under their care will probably be in brumation in the next month, and they don’t want to adopt them out while they are sleeping.
We also hear from KAWC's own Steven Hennig who is the parent of two desert tortoises.