Giant tortoise made a break for it — and was captured three miles away

An Arizona driver recently called 911 about a fellow traveler going slow enough along Interstate 10 that it was an emergency.

But it’s hard to blame the dangerous dawdler: a giant tortoise.

Stitch, a sulcata tortoise, had escaped from a nearby attraction. He wandered three miles before a driver called police to report the reptilian road hazard, the Arizona Department of Public Safety posted online Friday. He was found trying to cross Interstate 10 eastbound, about halfway between Tucson and Phoenix.

Sgt. Steven Sekrecki responded to the July 30 call and saw the tortoise’s name written on its shell. He told The Washington Post on Monday that he immediately knew the tortoise belonged to the Rooster Cogburn Ostrich Ranch because he has visited several times with his wife and daughter. He called, and the staff of the family-run attraction in Picacho, Ariz., confirmed that Stitch was theirs.

Sekrecki said he has responded to a horse, cows and birds on an interstate — but never a tortoise.

Staff at the ranch, which also features dwarf goats and miniature donkeys and says on its website that it has been featured on shows such as “Larry the Cable Guy — Only in America” and “Extreme Roadside Attractions,” did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

But ranch owner Danna Cogburn told Fox 10 Phoenix that Stitch was able to make his slow getaway because monsoon conditions earlier in the week blew open the front door to the tortoise enclosure, allowing most of the ambling animals access to a fenced-off area.

“Stitch, however, found the one small hole, and he was the only one small enough to fit through it,” Cogburn told the television station.

The ranch’s website warns visitors not to be fooled by the size of sulcata: “These tortoises are surprisingly agile and can move quickly when motivated — especially for food!”

It isn’t clear what motivated Stitch’s escape.

“I was surprised he had gone as far as he did,” Cogburn told Fox 10 Phoenix.

Sulcata tortoises are known as the African spurred tortoise. Their name comes from the Latin word “sulcus,” which means groove, because of the growth rings the tortoise grows each season, according to the Spring River Zoo in Roswell, N.M.

The sulcata are herbivores that live more than 50 years and grow to 24 to 30 inches in length and 70 to 200 pounds in weight, according to the Maryland Zoo in Baltimore. The sulcata are the third-largest tortoise species (bested only by the island-dwelling Aldabra and Galápagos tortoises) and the largest mainland tortoises in the world. The species is listed as “endangered” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

Home to one male and two females, the Maryland Zoo describes wild sulcata tortoises as “big, slow, and tough survivalists.” They dig burrows that delve between 30 inches and 10 feet underground. Native to the arid Sahara Desert and Sahel region, the sulcata ensure they don’t dry out by restricting their urine output to conserve moisture.

It’s a good thing because Stitch was found maneuvering a bone-dry strip without much promise of water.

Sekrecki said he was skeptical of the call at first because it’s difficult for drivers zipping by at high speeds to correctly identify something on the interstate.

“However, in my 16-year career, I don’t dismiss anything anymore,” he said.