Turtle Time

Now that summer is here, the turtles have made another appearance on the property. I found this shy, but handsome young man near our wooded area a few weeks ago. I wish I could have gotten a picture of his face and front legs; he was so pretty!

It's easy to tell the difference between male and female box turtles in a few ways: the males have very bright, orange-ish spots on their legs and face, as well as red eyes. The females are more muted and brown/yellow, with brown eyes.

Female on top, male on bottom
Photo from www.austinturtlepage.com

If you flip them over, you will see that males also have an indentation or divot on their bottom shell. This helps them fit more easily against the top of the female turtle shell during mating. It's kinda hard to see here, but it's there:

This little guy also had quite an impressive notch taken out of the front of his shell - I wonder what happened to him at one point in his life? Small, identifying marks like this help me keep track of turtles that we find around here. So far, I don't think I've seen the same turtle twice. Cool beans!

Also, I have a new bumper sticker that I put on both of our vehicles...I think this says it all:

The Turtle Whisperer

I have a thing for turtles. I think I have turtle karma, as they always seem to cross my path. It's like, "Oh yeah, NBD...there's another turtle". I see or find one at least once or twice a week, sometimes more, sometimes several in one day!

In Florida, there was Barry and Barbara, which always surprised me in my garden. I knew land turtles lived there, but as far as I knew, they weren't that common in suburban areas. Up here in Virginia, there are turtles all over the place, primarily the Eastern Box Turtle. My husband and I are on constant lookout to save stunned turtles from the middle of a busy road. I can't count how many turtles we have rescued. I've even found them on my property at times inside my fenced-in yard. How do they get in there?

My husband and I have a saying that goes, "One does not seek the turtle; the turtle chooses you," so imagine my delight when I saw this handsome guy/girl when I went out to water my garden this morning:

I came around the side of the house to the outside corner of my garage and there he/she was. My garage door was open and I didn't want he/she to scamper in (can turtles scamper?), so I left him/her where he/she was and closed the garage door. Apparently, he/she has somewhere important to go!

Hot Turtle Love

Last year, I suspected that Barry the Boxturtle might be a Barbara when I spotted him laying eggs. Yah think???

But there was a part of me that said, "Wait a minute, could it be that we have TWO resident turtles?" And this past weekend pretty much confirmed there is indeed a Barry and a Barbara.

Get a room you two!

Barry's Back and A Humble Harvest

Remember Barry the Box Turtle? Well last year, I saw him scurrying around the yard, I got a rare photo of him, then he disappeared. I figured my handling him the one or two times for photo-ops made him say "Screw this...I'm outta' here!" And then he was gone.

Well last weekend he showed back up! My local earthworm population must be shivering in their...um...slime? Poop? Dirt? Hopefully, he'll keep the local Cuban treefrogs in check too.
On other good things from the garden, we were able to harvest a small handful of yummy produce! I LOVE homegrown tomatoes, so hopefully, this is a sign of things to come. Small, I know, but here's hoping.
Everything is in full bloom and taking advantage of the small window between "Warm" and "Hot-As-Balls". That's an official temperature in Florida, dontcha' know!

Meet Barry the Turtle!

Meet Barry the Box Turtle! On occasion, I’ve heard some serious scurrying going on under the bushes & plants in the garden (can turtles scurry?). I never thought much of it, as we have quite an assortment of critters in our yard, to include Mr. Burns the garter snake, lizards, birds, squirrels, rabbits and whatever else comes out at night. But the other day, I found this little guy underneath a huge porterweed bush while I was hacking back my over-aggressive Joseph’s Coat.


At first, I started leaving him (her?) some veggies and salad to munch, but I later found out that box turtles are really carnivores (Hmmm…so who’s been eating the veggies I left?). Now I know what’s been happening to my earthworm population! Over the past year, I must have “relocated” close to 100 earthworms to my garden and never can find any when I dig. The soil is perfect for them, moist, lots of organic matter, poop (cow, not mine), leaves. Little monster!

Till then, he’s free to roam around and chill.