Add Yahoo as a preferred source to see more of our stories on Google. As monsoon rains bring much needed water to Arizona’s deserts, you may notice some of the state’s beloved shell-backed reptiles on ...

PHOENIX — They’re not fluffy, they don’t play fetch and they certainly don’t roll over. But there is such a thing as a lap tortoise. Dotty the desert tortoise climbs into the lap of Seyda Robertson in ...

State wildlife officials are adopting out captive desert tortoises and reminding Arizonans why pets cannot be released into the wild.

TUCSON, Ariz. - Federal officials have concluded that Sonoran desert tortoises native to Arizona have a relatively stable population that doesn’t need protection from environmental threats, but ...

The animals are also vulnerable to a range of deadly diseases such as upper respiratory illnesses and the shell disease cutaneous dyskeratosis, which softens their shells. Finally, as climate change ...

TUCSON (KVOA) - The Sonoran desert tortoise will not be placed under federal protection after the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service struck down potentially listing the shelled Arizonan under the ...

What has four scaly legs and spends 90% of its life underground? It could be your new pet. The Arizona Game and Fish Department’s desert tortoise adoption program began last week with more than 300 ...

This story is free to read because readers choose to support LAist. If you find value in independent local reporting, make a donation to power our newsroom today. Spotting a Mojave Desert tortoise is ...

On a crisp spring morning in 2016, biologists Tim Shields and Bill Boarman hiked into a remote area of California’s Mojave Desert to put an idea they had to the test. The arid Mojave touches four ...

I never imagined that closing dumpsters could help save an endangered species, but that's exactly what I learned during my time at The Living Desert Zoo and Gardens. What started as a volunteer ...

Take Two translates the day’s headlines for Southern California, making sense of the news and cultural events that affect our lives. Produced by Southern California Public Radio and broadcast from ...

PHOENIX — They’re not fluffy, they don’t play fetch and they certainly don’t roll over. But there is such a thing as a lap tortoise. What’s more, pet tortoises can wag their tails, will plod on up to ...