There's two words ya don't usually see together
Today at work I looked down toward the end of the driveway and saw a shape moving across the drive. Whatever it was, it was pretty large and in real danger of being run over. It was also causing traffic to swing wildly around it. I decided to walk down and see what was up.
As I drew near to it I saw that it was a very large softshelled turtle that had wandered out of one of the ponds and had somehow managed to get under the fence and into the path of traffic. Just about that time I also saw a semi truck coming in, right at the turtle.
I waved my arms and got the driver's attention and got him to stop. I walked closer to the errant turtle who caught sight of me about that time and made a mad dash back toward the pond. Unfortunately it didn't duck under the fence in the same spot it had come out and got stuck.
I walked to it to see what I could do. This was a really HUGE turtle. I mean really BIG. I was trying to figure out how to get it freed from the fence and back to the pond without hurting it or getting bitten (those jaws can remove a finger easily) when the truck driver walked over to see if he could help. I had him pull up on the fence while I grabbed the turtle's shell at the rear end and dragged it back.
Naturally it made a couple of attempts to bite me with those sharp, powerful jaws but I managed to jerk my hands back in time to avoid losing any fingers or other much liked parts. I could see the low point where it had made it's egress under the fence about 10 feet away and did what I could to steer the frightened animal toward it as it dragged me along behind it. (Bear in mind I weigh 200lbs, this was one strong turtle)
Finally the turtle recognized the point where it could safely get under the fence and made a mad dash to it and ran, literally, back to the pond. I've never seen a turtle move that fast.
The trucker and I exchanged handshakes and we both obviously felt pretty good about saving the animal from being run over or injury from the fence.
I filled in the low spot under the fence so the turtle would hopefully not find it's way back into the road again.
I wonder where he thought he was going anyway?
Maybe a silly topic, but it was my adventure of the day and I'm sure the turtle is better off for not being flattened by that semi.