Boy Donates Pet Turtle - Watches It Get Eaten

[k9angel]

http://au.news.yahoo.com/latest/a/-/latest...n-by-alligator/

A young Florida boy watched his pet turtle being eaten alive by an alligator, after he donated it to a local aquarium, the Pensacola News Journal reported.

In a distressing moment, Brenda Guthrie and her eight-year-old son Colton heard crunch noises from the turtle’s shell as it was devoured by the hungry reptile.

“Oh no alligator, let it go,” a hysterical Colton shouted at the alligator, begging it to release his turtle, but to no avail.

In front of their eyes, the red-eared slider turtle disappeared into the alligator’s jaws, with a horrified Colton jumping up and down screaming.

Brenda said the family donated their beloved pet, named Tomalina, to the Gulfarium in Florida when it outgrew their home aquarium.

The park was picked as a new home for Tomalina so that Colton could visit his pet whenever he liked.

Water park officials advised the alligator, Gracie, had just been hand fed and it is not common for them to be interested in turtles.

“It’s horrible for a little kid to have to see that,” General Manager Don Abrams reportedly told the Pensacola News Journal.

“That’s not unusual to put sliders in the same exhibit. (The alligators) have never eaten a turtle in the exhibit before."

[Robbi]

Oh thats awful for the little guy to see his pet eaten in front of his eyes. I caused my son a similar trauma when he was young, one of our horses had to be put down and the zoo came and took him away, my son kept asking where was Socks, I told him that Socksy had gone to the Adelaide Zoo, when we visited the zoo he was very excited as he thought Socks was going to be an exhibit I had to tell him that Socks had been eaten by the zoo animals.

In retrospect I could have done a better job with the whole situation

[Fit for a King]

err Robbi - you HAD to tell him he had been eaten? Could you just have said he died and went to heaven/somewhere?