Neighbor Donna sent this in to the Bernalwood Lost Animal Hotline last night:
I saw this poster on several fences on Brewster St. this afternoon. Keep your eyes open for a slow moving pet!
Indeed. If you find the missing creature, which is not native to Bernal Heights, please dial the number on your screen.
Bernalwood 
Todd,
Thanks for your post. Erin at SF Weekly let me know about it. This turtle may have been carried off by a raccoon who, hopefully, wasn’t able to get into his shell and dropped him somewhere. As a matter of fact, that may be how he mysteriously showed up in our yard about a year ago. We think he’s a Western Pond Turle, which means he’s mostly aquatic but also somewhat terrestial. He doesn’t answer to the name of Wes but might if he would answer to any name at all.
Hi George – It’s your Franconia neighbor, Kristin, here.
I hope I can shed a little light on the mysterious turtle. His name is actually Tortie (original, I know). My husband, Mike, and I adopted him many years ago when his 10-year old owner no longer wanted to care for him. He made the trip from Noe to Bernal with us in 2004 and in 2006 we built him a pond in the backyard. It was stocked with fish and deep with lots of hiding places… and we thought it was a perfect home for Tortie. We didn’t get any adoption info on him, but we, too, think he is a Western Pond Turtle and native to this climate. In winter he would hibernate under our deck and crawl out in the spring covered in dirt and hungry for crickets. A little over a year ago the pond was ransacked by a family of racoons – all the fish were eaten – all the plants were shredded – and our dog, who rushed out valiantly to defend the yard, ended up with emergency stitches. Tortie wasn’t taken that night, but he never returned to the pond and shortly thereafter went on walkabout. We’ve been on the lookout for him ever since. There was a reported sighting at the community garden but we were unable to find him there. I can’t believe he made the drop from our yard into yours! We’d very much like to find him – we had given up hope until we saw your sign. I’ve tried calling you but was unable to leave a message. Thanks Bernalwood for getting the word out.
How funny. We also lost a similar turtle a couple years ago and live at 55 Brewster. I don’t think it is the same one however; ours had a cracked shell. We assumed he was taken by raccoons and probably dead. It’s nice to know that he too could be living somewhere with another family. Ours was named Winston and he had a suicidal death drive that made him throw himself down stairs, which explains the crack. After we figured out his problem, he lived at the bottom of the deck happily for years. Well, maybe ‘happy’ is a stretch. He would pace back and forth looking longingly through the too small slots in the fence all day long, as he wanted to dive off that too. He did seem happy when he was eating lettuce out of your hand.