A female whose precious family pet huge tortoise vanished after he outgrew her house and was offered to a reptile rescue in Swindon exposed she got “teary-eyed” after being reunited..
Chris Winrow, 58, from St Helens, was offered the tortoise, which she called Victor Meldrew, in 2000 however rapidly understood that the reptile, which had actually been bought from a do it yourself shop, was no regular tortoise, however rather a huge African Sulcata.
After understanding that she might no longer keep him at her house she hesitantly handed him over to a Highworth-based reptile rescuer, Andrew Browne..
When she found that Browne had actually been imprisoned for 6 years in 2020 leading to his sanctuary, Swindon Reptile Rescue, being shut down, she desired to track Victor Meldrew down to make sure that he was fine, however had no concept if he was still alive or where he was..
LEARN MORE: Appeal for huge tortoise called Victor Meldrew after reptile sanctuary owner imprisoned.
The story had a pleased ending. The Adver ran a public appeal for details on the cold-blooded animal’s location, and exceptionally numerous individuals stepped forward to share where Victor Meldrew’s present house was.
When Mr Browne’s sanctuary was closed, Victor wound up at the National Centre for Reptile Well-being in Kent..
Now a year and a half after the preliminary appeal post was released, Chris was lastly able to make the journey from St Helens to be reunited with her precious family pet for the very first time in over 8 years, something she believed would never ever occur..
She stated: “Lastly, we were reunited with Victor the other day, it was so great to see him once again and to see he is living a fantastic life. His brand-new owner, Maria, is undoubtedly committed to all the animals in her care and she is beautiful, we invested about an hour there.
” We took Victor his preferred deals with, curly kale and corn on the cob which he rapidly destroyed with a little help from Honey the duck!”.
When it came time to leave Victor, Chris confessed that she did get psychological, however after years of fretting about him and how he was, she is now at ease..
” I did get a bit teary-eyed on leaving him however my mind is at rest now that l have actually seen him once again and understand that he is well and delighted, ideally, we will see him once again in the summertime of next year.”.
