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Saving Slowpoke, Barstow, CA (2026)

Our goal is to accomplish this through community outreach and involvement, specifically in underrepresented communities.

09/10/2026

🤠62nd Annual Daggett Days — September 12 & 13!🤠

📜 SATURDAY, SEPT. 12 — HISTORY DAY

9–11 AM | Daggett Community Center
Jeff Mahl, great-grandson of 1908 New York-to-Paris Race winner George Schuster, presents the incredible story of the Thomas Flyer.

🎟 $10 per person — pay at the door
☕ Coffee & Danish included
⚠️ Limited seating — RSVP: 760-254-3050

9 AM–3 PM
Visit the Daggett Museum, Daggett Cemetery, Stone Hotel and other historic locations.

🍽 11 AM–12 PM | MugWumps
Benefit lunch with smoked pork, macaroni salad, coleslaw, roll, dessert & drink.
🎟 $15 per person
Proceeds benefit the Daggett & Calico Historical Society.

🔨 1–3 PM | Alf’s Blacksmith Shop
Guided tours every 45 minutes.

🎉 SUNDAY, SEPT. 13 — FUN DAY | 9 AM–3 PM

Come out for 50+ local vendors, food, games, burros, a 25’ climbing wall, historic wagons, face painting, contests, drone displays, gunfighter shows & the parade starts at 12 PM

🐢 Saving Slowpoke will be in the park Sunday! Come say hello and learn about our Mojave Desert tortoises!

Daggett, California
September 12 & 13

DesertTortoise HighDesert

05/23/2026

Happy World Turtle Day!

Everyday is turtle day for us but today is the day to appreciate all of our shelled friends.

“But it’s a tortoise” some of you might say. Well, tortoises ARE turtles. Tortoises represent a relatively recent diversification within a shared 260-million-year evolutionary journey with other turtles. They branched off from their aquatic cousins around 70 million years ago! So not that recent.

Our desert tortoise is the largest reptile in the southwestern states and also California’s state reptile. Without it on the landscape we would lose the desert as we know it. So you all caring so much about it and being willing to speak up for it is how you can save this small part of the world.

We have 8 native turtle species in the state of California (if you count sea turtles) and 9 if you are a believer in mud turtles. All of them deserve love and advocacy from us.

05/16/2026

Just a friendly (non-paid) endorsement of this tortoise food brand. This is what desert tortoise food should look like.

We get a lot of questions about what to feed desert tortoises. Our answer is almost always something alluding to trying to match what they eat in the wild. We like presenting information this way because it gives us a chance to also talk about tortoise biology and physiology to people who may only know these animals as “pets.”

Desert tortoises are primarily grass eaters. Yes, they eat annual leafy greens and flowers during certain parts of the year, and sure, they’ll nibble on cactus. But grasses make up roughly 70–80% of their natural diet. They need fiber-rich grasses.

Trying to guide people toward a consistently good commercial product is tough. Native grasses can be hard to source and don’t always thrive outside the desert.

Our tortoises LOVE this stuff and, honestly, as someone who has seen A LOT of wild tortoise poop… I gotta say I don’t see much of a difference. 🐢

holler at us! 😉

05/04/2026

New merch is here!!! 🐢

We just dropped more Saving Slowpoke gear!!
inspired by the tortoises we work to protect every day.

From our new “Torpography” design, to classic black logo hats and our Tortoise Check magnets, every piece helps spread awareness and supports conservation.

Every purchase directly supports our mission—helping us travel to offer free educational classes and care for our mascot animals!

Shop now at…
Savingslowpoke.org/shop

05/03/2026

We’ve been busy!

This spring has been one of the busiest outreach seasons we have ever had. We reached thousands of young people and their families so far. From school event to h**p societies, events for military families and scout groups, career fairs and even birthday parties. Thats no exaggeration either. Our total between February and today is 2,326 and we still have more outreach events in the calendar.

Not only have we been doing this outreach, but our team is always actively contributing to desert tortoise conservation in the field as well, through our careers. That’s why in the coming months we are planning on offering presentations more focused on tortoise/desert careers and sharing our experiences to help would be biologists and conservationists get an idea of what to focus on! Catch us at career days etc!

Big things are happening for us this year and we wanted to post this to thank all of you for your continued support over the years. We can grow because of all of you and your love for our Desert Tortoise.

Stay tuned for more updates over the next couple months!

🐢❤️

(All photos are posted with permission from parents, interactions with tortoises in the field are supervised and under state and federal permits)

Address

Barstow, CA
92311

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