Hi Everyone!
We would like to officially introduce our new Cosmos Clique member, and here's the story...



On the Christmas day this year, my sister and I went to visit our relatives who are staying in the far end of Singapore in the late evening (yesterday). After the visiting, we decided to visit the nearby park (there's a stadium within the park too) since the last time we were there was like at least 10 years ago.

Not long after we reach the stadium area that's in the park, our attention was caught by a PRC family's kid. Out of curiosity, we went forward to find out more and there, we saw the kid spotted a turtle.



It is a Malayan Box Turtle aka MBT (sounds familiar huh? It's the same species as our Xing Yue~), and it appears to be an adult turtle as observed from its size and the height of its doom shaped shell. The turtle was so scared and intimidated by the PRC family such that it went hiding into its shell totally!

Just as we were about to walk away from the steep slope where the MBT was found, we saw the oldest member (probably the grandfather) picking up the turtle and turn its plastron up towards him for his own viewing.

I was really pissed off by that old member's action as he is intimidating the poor turtle even further! So I went forward to the family and overheard the old member's nonsense: "It's not dead, it cant die that easily," I was like seriously??? What the hell nonsense are you blabbering to the poor turtle! I asked the old member politely to put the turtle back to the ground and told him that his action will only cause more fear and stress to the turtle.

And so the old member placed the turtle back to the ground and their family left the area after a couple of minutes.

As we walked back after going a big round along the lake, we saw the MBT still around the same area and we thought that it's weird.  We walked around the lake a few times more but did not see any turtle nor terrapin at all. So we went towards the turtle and poor some water on fresh big leaves for it to drink), we were really concern and worried about the turtle and suspect that it might not be wild, but more of a captive turtle.

Perhaps it was being abandon in the park, as the spot where we saw it does not make any sense at all: 

• Point 1: MBT likes water very much, and to find it located at the steep slope that's very near to the stadium's human walk path is just weird.
• Point 2: When humans walk near it, it does not escape on the spot, which doesn't seems to be turtle from the wild.
• Point 3: We talk to the turtle and it actually shows signs of 'listening', wild turtles wouldn't even care less if you are talking to it or not.

Not bearable to leave the turtle behind like that, we decided to bring it home (of course, after our mum's advice).

We put the turtle into a big plastic bag which we happen to bring around and took it to the toilet for wash up. Still a little concern if this turtle is from the wild, we stopped for a moment and i said to the turtle that we are going to bring him/her home, if he/she does not want to be with us, simply moves while I count to 10. And surprisingly, the turtle did not move at all and was looking at me.

After bringing the MBT home, we wash it up further more and brushes its shell. Judging from the appearance and size, we presume that this turtle is a female, and since we decided to keep her for long, my sister named her as Liu Xing, which means Meteor in Chinese. We are not putting LX with the Cosmos babies yet as we are not sure if LX has any health conditions at the moment, and her size is simply too big as compared to them.

Christmas is usually deem as just a public holiday for people to get together, but this year's Christmas is so special as we receive Liu Xing as a X'mas gift.




Liu Xing is cute too isn't she??

Labels: Cosmos, New Member