Turtle Power- who has one?

From what I've read, leopard tortoises can suffocate if left flipped over for too long. I don't know what time he flipped, but it was sometime between 7PM and 630AM. Its very rare for them to get on their backs in the wild, since it it usually is a death sentence. He's flipped over before but I always found him before anything happened. This time was just too long.

 

Lot of turtles this year, I've removed 16 so far. Normally its 6 or so.
These guys live in the yard, see them pretty often and this guy came out after the rain the other day.

I had a Desert Tortoise as a kid, it was a trippy animal.

 

Was out in the yard earlier and found this wayward turtle.

 

I’ve got 4 turtles in the biggest waterland tub they make(240 gallons). The biggest one is a yellow bellied slider, then the second biggest is the Mississippi map turtle, then the male which is a western painted turtle and the smallest and most aquatic is a our mud turtle which is the hardest to see. Bender our mini schnauzer loves staring at them. He likes to try and sneak up on them so they don’t jump in.

 

Winter is coming. The guy I got my tortoise from said build him a shelter. My back yard is tropical style so I had that in mind.

Grabbed a few scrap board of plywood and went to it. Inside dimensions are 12"x18" and 9"-11" with a slant roof. I asked the misses if I should stain it blue or torch it, she said torch it so the mapp gas went to work. Sealed it up and letting it dry a few days before I put it in the yard. I'm gonna stuff it with hay or straw. Inside isn't sealed but should be fine. Worst case if it doesn't last long I can build another, I have a lot of scrap plywood I got for free. If he goes in there I may look for some scrap shingles or something to do the roof. I thought about hitting it with bed liner but the kind I have doesn't bead properly on wood, it soaks in.

 

We have a backyard full of box turtles. They are not native to central California. Originally I bought 2 from a pet store because they looked sick and I figured they would die if not rescued. That was 35 years ago and they are still thriving in the backyard. A couple more were given to us by people who said they no longer wanted them. They lay their eggs and now we have multiple offspring joining the crowd. My dog searches out the babies often bringing them into the house to show them. She never harms them.
In response to another poster: Turtle’s lungs are positioned near the top of their shells. When upside down the other organs in their bodies compress their lungs making it difficult to breath. If not uprighted they will suffocate. Thanks for all the great pictures.

 

Found another "disturbed" looking area in our yard yesterday. My suspicions were correct, our leopard tortoise laid 10 more eggs. Brings the total to 24 in the incubator.

 

I have lots of box turtles at my house. Lots of pictures of them not even woke up yet in the early spring.

I have pictures going back 20+ years of the same turtles. You can go a few years and not see a certain turtle and...Bam...he or she is back. The last picture is from a turtle that I had not seen in 9 years. He's back this year.

I try to get good pictures of the markings on the shell to identify them.

 

So you released a non native species from a pet store... on purpose? This quickly brings to mind the python problems of the everglades.

 

Growing up we had a turtle named Speedy that loved to wander around our apartment and eat cheetos.

Later we were given a desert tortoise named Sparky that had been injured and nursed him back to health. Had him a few years until he flipped over and basically baked in the Arizona sun.

 

We have Turtles...
easy 5' wide flipper to flipper.

 

Our pond turtle is a female and lays eggs every summer. We have no male so the eggs are not fertile and will never hatch. Turtles produce eggs even without fertilization. If they are not laid they will rot inside their bodies and kill them. While gardening I found this clutch she had laid. It will be interesting to hear if the eggs you have hatch.

 

I liked this when I saw the first parts, bummer on the last part.

 

I mean it was a bit of a rollercoaster.

As for the cheeto fiend, we discovered that one day when he got loose and we were all woken up in the middle of the night by a loud crunching noise. Turns out my brother had dropped a bag behind the desk and Sparky was happily munching away on them. It was the funniest most - initially terrifying - thing we had ever witnessed.

 

Hahaha!

 

The second set of 10 eggs are starting to develop a red spot in them. The first 4 she laid I don't think are fertile. Time will tell on the eggs I dug up yesterday. Up until the other leopard died, they had been mating pretty much every day for a month.

 

Steve the desert tortoise, probably 30+ years old

 

Ok, not a turtle but found this guy in the trees the other day. It was either a Black Racer or water snake.
Didn’t get to see it’s under side. It was 3 feet long. It eventually slithered off.

 

Update on the tortoise eggs. We now have 31 eggs incubating, with at least 20 of which being fertile. I candled them on Friday AND THERE WAS MOVEMENT INSIDE. It was freakin' nuts to see, I definitely wasn't expecting that!

 

That’s awesome!!!!

 

Welp. Looks like one in the first clutch was fertile! Hatched on Monday night some time.

 

7 have hatched so far! Gave one away, here's the remaining 6 enjoying a soak. The predominantly black one is the first hatchling. He's a good eater (obviously).

 

We had a pet snapping turtle. He came from the creek behind the house and fell in love with the bread we were tossing to the fish. He eventually came out of the water to get the bread directly, first tossed to him and later hand fed to him. The only time he was threatening (hissing, etc) was when he didn't get the bread from us quickly enough.

He eventually started following us around, bread or no bread. If we sat down, he would sit nearby watching. He even wanted to follow us into the house (climbing the steps), but we decided a big old snapping turtle probably wasn't a good household pet. Just imagine tripping over him during a visit to the bathroom at night.

We also had a pet otter in that same creek. He never came out of the water to us, but he would swim nearby, waving, splashing, doing flips, bringing fish to us, and other such silliness. He was a real character. We especially liked him because he kept the ducks who wanted to camp out under our house away.

 

Are you keeping them? They look beautiful.

 

Keeping the biggest one since it looks like a clone of it's dad (Died 07/2021). Giving away the others to whoever wants one. As long as they provide proof of having the right equipment to raise a hatchling then I don't want any money for them.

Also...16 have hatched so far

 

Trouble is out and hungry. 87 degrees here so slumber season is over. Coco checking him out.

 

On lunch break I went out to trim a few burnt banana tree leaves, I noticed my turtle following me. Every leaf I dropped he had to check out, sniff, put his mouth on but didn't eat. He kept looking at me after as if "what else do you have?"

I shifted to watering and as I'm using the hose I felt something pinch me. I turned around and its my turtle biting the back of my ankle! I turned around and stupidly said "what are you doing?" He made eye contact and ran to me with his mouth open, crazed zombie style, and bit my toe!

I ran inside and sliced an apple. Gave him 3 slices and he chilled out. Crazy little guy.

 

Update: 20 have hatched now!

If anyone in the Socal area wants one, just show proof of having the right equipment for a hatchling.