It takes a village – or a Phoenix suburb – to wrangle a wayward tortoise

Rex, the tortoise, at Brian and Sara Westfall's home, who fostered him while they searched for his owner, in Scottsdale, Arizona. Adriana Zehbrauskas for NPR/57999420m hide caption

His name was Rex because he looked like a dinosaur.

The giant sulcata tortoise came lumbering down a suburban Phoenix street one recent spring evening. A gaggle of dumbfounded neighbors milled about him. I was among them.

Questions swirled. Where did he come from? How far had he come? Was he hungry? Thirsty? Tired?

Rex walks as a group of neighbors watches. Alina Hartounian/NPR hide caption

His unlikely stroll down a sidewalk stirred the neighborhood into a tizzy and set in motion a multi-pronged effort to find his owners. But, more than just a fun commotion on a Tuesday night, Rex's daring getaway shows just how challenging owning a sulcata tortoise can be, even though the pet trade is so widespread that sulcata ownership featured as a punchline in a Saturday Night Live sketch .

'So damn cute'

View of one of five newborn African spurred tortoise (Centrochelys Sulcata) at the zoo, in Guadalajara, Mexico, Jalisco state, on May 17, 2018. Ulises Ruiz/AFP via Getty Images hide caption

When sulcatas hatch, they're the size of golf balls.

"They're so damn cute, you can't help but [say] 'Oh, I want to take one or two of these home for my kids,'" said Dan Marchand, founder of the Phoenix Herpetological Sanctuary. "But it doesn't take long before it's taken up your yard. It's tearing up your garden. It's knocking over furniture."

They may start out tiny, but African sulcatas grow to be the third-largest tortoise in the world. The U.S. banned their importation in the early 2000s, but breeding remains legal. They can weigh up to 200 pounds and live up to 150 years. Rex himself is at least a couple feet long. Some are sold in small, plastic pet carriers. But they require large, grassy outdoor enclosures to roam and graze in, access to clean water and dry, warm shelter during winter months. And they're diggers. But many people don't know any of this when they buy the tortoises. They're often sold as novelties at reptile shows with very little information on how much care they require, Marchand said.

"If you do your homework and you're prepared for the size and what they can do to your yard and if you give them the right set up, they can be a fantastic pet. You just have to be prepared," he said.

Marchand should know. His sanctuary is home to about 700 of the gentle giants. They arrived there over the span of 20 years. Some were like Rex, found wandering the streets and turned in to the sanctuary. Some were left behind in backyards for new homeowners who never wanted to tend to a colossal reptile. Others just became too much for their owners to handle.

"They're not destructive by nature, but they're just so big, they don't realize how strong they are. They don't go around anything. They just go through it. So they become a little destructive," Marchand said.

Eclecteri Tortoise & Reptile Rescue/Sanctuary, based in Casa Grande, Ariz., takes in roughly 1,250 sulcatas a year and refers at least another 1,000 to other rescues, says owner Teri Boyungs.

Unlike desert tortoises, which are native to the U.S., "there's no government or county support for this species and the few private rescues that take them in are inundated each year," she said via Facebook chat. "Arizona is ground zero for the chaos as our climate allows the eggs to ground hatch easily and each female can have 60+ babies a year."

She said the overwhelming majority of the abandoned tortoises come from people who just can't take care of them anymore.

Rex very easily could have ended up like one of those surrendered tortoises. But he lucked into a neighborhood fully invested in his fate.

Chicken Nugget

Sara Westfall's 5-year-old daughter was the first to spot Rex moseying down the sidewalk.

"We were eating dinner at our front dining room table and my daughter goes, 'Daddy, a tortoise!'" said Westfall. "We thought maybe it was the neighbor's lawn decoration or whatever. And we go outside and we're like, 'Oh, my gosh, that's a real tortoise!' And he's huge."

Westfall went to a neighbor who knew of tortoise owners in the area. That's when I got a knock on my door. Luckily, my desert tortoise named Dotty was safely snoozing in my backyard.

Dotty the desert tortoise eats some flowers. Alina Hartounian/NPR hide caption

She's the size of a dinner plate. Rex was more comparable to the size of a large dinner platter.

I joined the gaggle of neighbors gathered around him as he trotted down the sidewalk. One neighbor got him some lettuce. We made 'Found tortoise' posts on Facebook and Nextdoor as we all asked each other what to do with him.

Eventually Rex was hoisted into a wheelbarrow and rolled into Westfall's backyard. Her daughter called him Chicken Nugget, a favorite naming convention of hers. And the family set to making Rex comfortable.

Westfall ordered hay online, and dug a pit for a shallow pool so Rex could soak. They stopped mowing the lawn so Rex could graze, and fed him carrots.

"He's a good little houseguest," Westfall said.

Westfall posted signs around the neighborhood that read "Large Tortoise Found." For days, they waited, and answered a number of calls from neighbors checking to see how Rex was doing.

Then, about five days after his great escape, his owners reached out.

T. Rex

Brian and Sara Westfall with Rex, the tortoise. They fostered him while searching for his owner. Adriana Zehbrauskas for NPR/57999420m hide caption

Frank Boxberger bought Rex at a San Diego pet store roughly 15 years ago.

"[Sulcata tortoises] were just roaming around the store with these sticks and flags on their backs 5 feet high. Just so people would see them," said Boxberger. "And I think, 'These are the coolest tortoises I've ever seen because they look like dinosaurs.' "

And that's how Rex got his name. He was an adult back then, and has grown by another foot or so in length since, Boxberger estimates. He's likely about 35 years old at this point, he said, barely middle aged for his species.

For 15 years, Rex lived in the backyard of Boxberger's Arizona home.

"Everytime I came out into the backyard, he would come up and see me," said Boxberger. "Now I think it's because I usually fed him, but it still was fun."

Boxberger imagined Rex becoming a generational pet, being handed down to his great grandchildren. He played major roles in family events, like his daughter's wedding in their backyard.

"We strapped a sort of a beer cooler on his back," Boxberger said. "He was sort of the wedding favorite when he walked around the backyard as our beer burro, we called him. But he was really our beer tortoise."

But Rex's destructive streak had been getting too much for Boxberger and his wife. They wanted to redo the landscaping because of Rex's digging. So, Rex was temporarily rehomed at Boxberger's mom's house, which was up for sale.

Boxberger believes Rex escaped when someone touring the home left the gate open.

Bowser, maybe?

Garret Beshey carries Rex, the tortoise, to his truck. Mr. Beshey is adopting him. Adriana Zehbrauskas for NPR/57999420m hide caption

Boxberger's daughter spotted one of Westfall's flyers and made the call. At that time, Boxberger was already planning on rehoming Rex.

He offered Rex to Westfall, who despite adoring the creature, couldn't take him in permanently.

Beshey is a plumber who was working with the woman buying the house where Rex had been staying.

"I've always wanted [a sulcata]. I've just never wanted to purchase one, honestly, because I feel bad for purchasing, given the excessive breeding that goes on with these guys," said Beshey as he prepared to take Rex home one afternoon.

The pet trade has become somewhat problematic, Marchand said.

"Pet stores and the reptile trade shows, they have the vendors who are out there and they just want to move merchandise. They don't want to educate," said Marchand.