Wanganui's homeless turtle may end up remaining where he is, but history shows he probably won't be the last one we'll see in the wild.
Following two previous appearances in the Chronicle, and posts on her Facebook page, Gonville pet shop owner Karen Thompson said the reptile had proved popular with visitors.
Despite all the interest shown by the public, his owners had still not come forward, but she said that wasn't a problem.
``I'm getting to like having a turtle around the place. I never thought I would. He seems perfectly happy and just loving it here, but I'd be more than happy to pass him on to his people if they were to come forward,'' she said.
Ms Thompson said she was on the hunt for both a bathtub and a name for the turtle.
``I don't have a tank big enough for him, so I'm trying to find a bath for him to live in. At the moment he's just in the middle of the shop keeping an eye on things. He likes to scoot around the place. I've also started a `name the turtle' competition because, like all the other creatures I have here, if he stays, he gets named.''
She said the sudden attention focused on the new arrival had temporarily forced him into hiding.
``Last week I think he got a bit overwhelmed by all the visitors, as he'd started hiding under shelves. I had a bit of trouble finding him for a while,'' she said.
Online comments and phone calls suggested Ms Thompson had one of Virginia Lake's shelled residents, but she said that was unlikely, as he was too friendly to be wild.
Springvale man Barry Norman often walks around Virginia Lake and agreed the turtles tended to shy away from human attention, but said they could be spotted if you took the time to find them.
``I've seen them various times, but they're quite elusive. Often you'll see them sitting on a log, but I have seen them just paddling around. They're the sort of thing you would miss unless you were really looking for them,'' Mr Norman said.
Last year he received a call from a fellow walker who had seen a female turtle acting strangely on a bank.
``I ripped up there with my camera and saw she had dug a hole maybe 2.5-inches across. She was digging one leg at a time, using her claws to get the dirt out.
``As I was watching, her tail lifted and she began to lay these eggs, but they were more like tubes instead of individual eggs like you'd see on a nature programme. Someone called the council, so they came and helped her cover the eggs,'' Mr Norman said.
He said the soil was never disturbed and the eggs may not have hatched.
The turtles at Virginia Lake aren't the only wild examples to be seen in Wanganui. In 2005 a red-eared terrapin was spotted swimming in the Whanganui River near the City Wharf off Taupo Quay. Fisherman Kelvin Abbott and Sean Hoskins, a reporter with the Wanganui Chronicle at the time, dived in to catch the creature but to no avail.
The Chronicle also understands that in 1947 a group of fishermen looking for flounder in the Whanganui River caught a large sea turtle in their net. Its fate is unknown.-->