{"id":251627,"date":"2026-04-04T13:05:11","date_gmt":"2026-04-04T13:05:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/251627\/"},"modified":"2026-04-04T13:05:11","modified_gmt":"2026-04-04T13:05:11","slug":"sacramento-woman-in-ill-health-seeks-new-home-for-tortoise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/251627\/","title":{"rendered":"Sacramento woman in ill health seeks new home for tortoise"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ownership of a tortoise, like life itself, has its downsides. Mona Heflin knows both well.<\/p>\n

Slim Shady, her roughly 70-pound, 22-year-old sulcata tortoise, farts loudly, sometimes knocks her down and has forced her to find him after absconding in her North Highlands neighborhood when her front gate was left open. Still, she loves him and doesn\u2019t seem enthusiastic about the idea of giving him up. But she must.<\/p>\n

Heflin is 71, her husband died in 2018, she takes care of an adult son with diabetes and she has her own health issues. She said she has an aortic aneurysm and blocked arteries and is reluctant to have the bypass surgery she needs. She needs the joy her tortoise brings, but not the trouble.<\/p>\n

Slim Shady needs a new home.<\/p>\n

She will miss him dancing, which she taught him to do. She will miss him responding to her call and following her. She will just miss him.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s been times when he shows me love and compassion,\u201d Heflin said. \u201cAnd it\u2019s the cutest thing.\u201d As his namesake would say, to paraphrase, she loves living in the moment. But now has the once in a lifetime opportunity to find him a new home.<\/p>\n

Pet tortoises like Slim Shady commonly wind up needing a new home. Tortoises typically live 80 to 150 years. One particularly famous tortoise, Jonathan, is about 193 years old and was the subject of an April Fool\u2019s Day death hoax<\/a>. Guinness World Records noted in 2019 that Jonathan was \u201cthe oldest-known land animal alive today.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

How Slim Shady came to Heflin\u2019s family<\/p>\n

Originally, Slim Shady\u2019s name was Sadie. Heflin\u2019s family thought he was female.<\/p>\n

It was the mid-2000s. Heflin\u2019s granddaughter Sierra Scorcio was living with her and had asked her mother, Heflin\u2019s former daughter-in-law, for a water turtle. Scorcio\u2019s mother returned from a trip with the tortoise. Scorcio, who was about 8 at the time, named it Sadie after a character from a Disney show.<\/p>\n

Sometime thereafter, they brought the tortoise they knew as Sadie to a pet store. There, the tortoise became visibly aroused seeing another tortoise. Scorcio nearly dropped her tortoise, thinking his reaction meant that he was dying.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey ended up telling us that in the wild, that\u2019s how they showed dominance and let other tortoises know that they\u2019re a male and they\u2019re here and they\u2019re present,\u201d Scorcio said. \u201cAnd that\u2019s the day we found out that Sadie was actually a male.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Mona Mona Heflin’s 22-year-old tortoise, Slim Shady, walks around in her front yard at her home in Sacramento on Thursday, March 26, 2026. Heflin is seeking a new home for the tortoise, which could live to be up to 150 years old. PAUL KITAGAKI JR. pkitagaki@sacbee.com <\/p>\n

Scorcio, who was a fan of rapper Eminem, renamed her tortoise Slim Shady.<\/p>\n

In general, having a tortoise was both an unusual and rewarding childhood experience for Scorcio. The family treated him like an ordinary dog or cat. She brought her tortoise everywhere with her, including to her school for show-and-tell when she was in the fourth grade. Everyone \u201cthought he was cool,\u201d Scorcio said.<\/p>\n

\u201cBack in the early 2000s, not a lot of people had desert tortoises walking around their front yard in North Highlands,\u201d Scorcio said. \u201cBut everybody seemed to really like it. I still have friends to this day that\u2019ll go by and check on him and my grandma.\u201d<\/p>\n

Heflin said that school buses of children take note of Slim Shady and that police officers have stopped by to take photos with him. \u201cHe\u2019s made quite a name for himself,\u201d Heflin said.<\/p>\n

Scorcio, like her grandmother, has been close with Slim Shady from the beginning.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s just a big lover with the biggest personality,\u201d Scorcio said.<\/p>\n

\"Mona Mona Heflin’s 22-year-old tortoise, Slim Shady, walks in her front yard at her home in Sacramento on Thursday, March 26, 2026. Heflin is seeking a new home for the tortoise, as he could outlive her. PAUL KITAGAKI JR. pkitagaki@sacbee.com Personality under the shell<\/p>\n

Tortoises can charm with their unique personalities, explained Jim Stout, executive director and CEO of the Tortoise Conservancy Inc, which is based near Orlando, Florida.<\/p>\n

Stout recalled a gopher tortoise his family called Herman that lived nearby for a few years during Stout\u2019s childhood. Gopher tortoises can wander off to live elsewhere and Stout\u2019s family eventually lost track of him. But in the years he lived nearby, Herman would amble up to the side of Stout\u2019s family swimming pool.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy mom would bring us out lettuce, so we\u2019d sit there and hand-feed him,\u201d Stout said. \u201cHe\u2019d go back off afterwards and do his thing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Scorcio eventually couldn\u2019t be physically close to Slim Shady anymore. Near the end of 2014, Scorcio moved to Oregon, having struggled with substance abuse as a teenager in Sacramento.<\/p>\n

Scorcio is now 30, lives in Portland and said she has been clean for 12 years. She now has a daughter, Cadynce and a son, Tanner who love Slim Shady and see him when they visit Heflin. Scorcio still considers Slim Shady to be her tortoise, though she said her apartment wouldn\u2019t be appropriate for him.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would love to take Shady,\u201d Scorcio said. \u201cI don\u2019t have a yard to put him in. If I had a way to have like $5,000 to rent a house tomorrow, I would do it in a heartbeat and I would come get him.\u201d<\/p>\n

Where Slim Shady might go<\/p>\n

Heflin and Scorcio have ruled out some possible destinations for Slim Shady.<\/p>\n

A neighbor once asked Heflin what she might sell him for. Heflin did research online and said she saw that a grown tortoise might fetch $1,200. She asked her neighbor where Slim Shady would be living. He explained that it would be his backyard where he had a wooden fence.<\/p>\n

Heflin turned this down. She has a wrought iron fence in her front yard for Slim Shady. He can chew through wooden fences.<\/p>\n

If Slim Shady were to go to a private owner, Heflin said she hoped that the home \u201cwould provide safe containment. Because that\u2019s what I worry about most, getting out and getting hit by a car.\u201d Scorcio worries about Slim Shady going to a private owner, not confident they would be up to the responsibility of caring for him.<\/p>\n

Most, if not all, of Heflin and Scorcio\u2019s family either can\u2019t or won\u2019t take Slim Shady.<\/p>\n

\"Mona Mona Heflin’s 22-year-old tortoise, Slim Shady, drinks water from a bowl in her front yard at her home in Sacramento on Thursday, March 26, 2026. Heflin is seeking a new home for the tortoise. PAUL KITAGAKI JR. pkitagaki@sacbee.com <\/p>\n

Scorcio is not the only one who worries about whether a private individual can properly care for a tortoise. Katie Rickon is the owner and founder of the nonprofit Tortoise Acres Rescue & Sanctuary near Redding and is cautious about future homes for the tortoises she cares for. She knows how people respond to such stories.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019re going to have everybody and their mother, \u2018Oh, that poor lady, we\u2019ll adopt that tortoise\u2019 and they\u2019re not ready for it,\u201d Rickon said.<\/p>\n

She said tortoises sometimes stay at her sanctuary for eight months before a proper home is found.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe screen our people like absolute crazy,\u201d Rickon said. \u201cThey have to have a quarter of an acre minimum to have a sulcata. You can\u2019t have a house in a backyard. It just doesn\u2019t work. They have to have a lot of acreage to be able to roam around.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rickon said that at 70 pounds, Slim Shady was undersized and likely hadn\u2019t had adequate space for his habitat to this time. She noted a 30-year-old tortoise that was 220 pounds.<\/p>\n

Other options include, potentially, the Sacramento Zoo, which has multiple tortoises. Nancy Smith-Fagan, a zoo spokesperson said she would have to check with a zoo caretaker to see if there was a potential place for Slim Shady.<\/p>\n

Sanctuaries like Rickon\u2019s are an option, too, though it can be competitive to get tortoises in. Rickon said she had arranged adoptions for more than 3,200 tortoises across the country in eight years and that she turns away 20 potential donations per week. She attributed the level of interest in tortoise donation to life changes.<\/p>\n

\u201cCOVID, I was just inundated,\u201d Rickon said. \u201cPeople have to move or they\u2019re in a rental house and they get kicked out and then they leave their tortoise behind.\u201d<\/p>\n

Situations like Heflin\u2019s aren\u2019t unusual, either. Rickon estimated that around half the calls she gets are related to people in ill health who have a tortoise and don\u2019t have family members willing to care for it next. Rickon noted that many have her sanctuary in their wills.<\/p>\n

Rickon expressed interest in picking up Slim Shady, though she also said it was $1.25 per mile and that there was a $200 surrender fee.<\/p>\n

\"Mona Mona Heflin, 71, watches her 22-year-old tortoise, Slim Shady, walk in the front yard of her home in Sacramento on Thursday, March 26, 2026. Heflin is seeking a new home for the tortoise, as he could live to be 150 years old \u2014 outliving her. PAUL KITAGAKI JR. pkitagaki@sacbee.com <\/p>\n

At the end of the day, where Slim Shady goes could come down to how Heflin and Scorcio feel about it. Scorcio has researched sanctuaries and has mixed feelings about them, noting that tortoises are monogamous and mate for life.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just don\u2019t want him to get lost in the mix of other turtles,\u201d Scorcio said.<\/p>\n

Heflin also has an emotional bond with Slim Shady.<\/p>\n

\u201cOnce a day,\u201d Heflin said, \u201cI\u2019ll come out and talk with him and rub his whole shell and let him know he\u2019s a good boy and I love him, God loves him and everything\u2019s cool.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n \"Profile
\n <\/a><\/p>\n

Graham Womack<\/a><\/p>\n

The Sacramento Bee<\/p>\n

Graham Womack is a general assignment reporter for The Sacramento Bee. Prior to joining The Bee full-time in September 2025, he freelanced for the publication for several years. His work has won several California Journalism Awards and spurred state legislation.\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ownership of a tortoise, like life itself, has its downsides. Mona Heflin knows both well. Slim Shady, her…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":251628,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[121,123,122],"class_list":["post-251627","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sacramento","tag-sacramento","tag-sacramento-headlines","tag-sacramento-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251627","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=251627"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251627\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/251628"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=251627"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=251627"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=251627"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}