Her ordeal happened when the voracious rodent decided to chew off the appendage while the tortoise, thought to be about 45 years old, was fast asleep during her winter hibernation. But experts think she somehow managed to fight off the rodent and save her life despite her sleepy state. After vets had operated to save her life at the end of last year, Norfolk Tortoise Club in Norwich called vets to fit the wheel to get her fully mobile again.
Eleanor Tirtasana, the club’s chief re-homing officer, said: ‘She can now scoot around freely and gives her mates a run for their money at feeding time.’
The op was carried out last month after her father Philip Chubb had engineered the new limb after buying a toy tractor at a car boot sale.
He explained: ‘She was mobile but very off balance and slow. We knew we needed to think of something that would help her without hurting her obviously. She was rubbing away her shell because it was scraping along the ground when she walked.
It was a problem that would have lead to more complications.’
