TURTLE STORIES, NEWS & VIEWS 

November 2004

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In This Issue:

1.)    From Turtle Wife

2.)    Reader Stories

3.)    Worldwide Turtle Story Roundup

4.)    Links I Love

5.)    Just for Fun

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1. FROM TURTLE WIFE

This and that at our place.

The big news at our house: Bitsy, one of our five Eastern box

turtles—the one with the bite taken out of her shell behind her

neck, probably by a dog—laid four eggs in the turtle habitat last

week. Allen found them before she or one of her companions

could inadvertently dig them up and scramble them. The eggs

are now nestled in a moist paper towel in a small plastic soup

container that’s sitting on top of an empty fish tank. Will they

hatch? They’ve chalked up, so we know they’re viable. In about

90 days, we hope to have baby box turtles!

You will laugh, but I thought we had six Eastern box turtles.

Apparently I’ve been so caught up with E.T., my ball python

who is the new herp in the house, that I’ve been ignoring

everyone else, along with the fact that Allen adopted out the

male box turtle who was harassing the females 24/7. We

didn’t even have a name for this guy, which undoubtedly

made it easier for me to forget all about him. Our females,

Shelly, Bitsy, and Ginny, must be relieved to be left alone to

eat and sleep and bask. Lesta and Omni, our two remaining

males, haven’t nearly the sex drive of our happily departed

turtle.

Meantime, Allen has discovered a way to get his protein-lovin’

box turtles to eat the fruits and vegetables they need, but turn

up their beaks at after being spoiled with earthworms. First,

he defrosts a mouse for E.T. by letting it sit in a plastic container

filled with hot water for fifteen minutes. After he drops said

mouse into E.T.’s  tank (it’s gone in an instant) he dips the box

turtles’ fruits and veggies into the "mouse" water. The turtles

gobble these delicacies right up. We’re planning to keep

"mouse-infused veggies" on the turtle menu for some time.

If you have any special tricks for getting a turtle to eat, or

want to share the strangest food your turtle/tortoise eats,

please send them in and I’ll print them next month. In the

meantime, you can read a short anecdote about Minnie, a

diet-challenged chelonian, below. Minnie sounds like our

sometimes willful cats. No, I take it back. Our cats have

never turned up their noses at food. 

Anita Salzberg

Turtle Wife & Editor-in-Chief
http://www.turtlewife.com

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2. Reader Stories

Minnie, Who is Quite Finicky 

Caroline Leavitt

Minnie, my Burmese jagged shell, gets in really bad moods.

He’s very smart for a reptile, and if he doesn’t like the food

I supply, he goes over to his small water bowl, grabs it in

his  mouth and tips it over!  He has an odd diet. Loves cottage

cheese (found in the wild, right?) bananas, strawberries and

avocado. Also squid tentacles, earthworms and scallops.

Tomatoes. He loves them. And lettuce. He was furious

 when I tried ground meat.

And yes, we thought Minnie was a she until he showed off his

manhood (we thought he was somehow expelling his intestines

and ran frantic to the vet, who laughed and explained turtle

birds and bees to us.)

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The L.A. Snapper

by Anonymous

I now reside in the Los Angeles area; having relocated from

New York City eleven years ago. I have an exotic pet sitting

business that concentrates on the care of domesticated birds

and herps. One of my clients was a juvenile male snapping

turtle. Now as anyone in California knows, it is illegal to keep or

release a non-native snapping turtle in our state.

So, I was sworn to secrecy regarding the ownership of this

charge. The snapper lived in a large tank in an apartment in

Westwood (near UCLA). Apparently this turtle never learned

that he was a snapping turtle.

His owner thought she was doing a good deed at the time when

she "rescued" this little baby snapper one snowy November day

by the bank of a stream in Connecticut several years ago (what

can I say; many people are ecologically and natural history-

wise ignorant).

The baby snapper eventually relocated to sunny SoCal with its

owner. When I cared for the snapper, I had to let him have his

"walkabout" around the apartment while I changed the water in

his tank.

Every other day it was requested that I allow him to sleep in his

bedbox with a pillow and a stuffed turtle on top of him. The

next day he’d go back in his water tank.

This snapping turtle did exhibit a certain amount of curiosity.

He would at times follow me in the kitchen while I prepared to

fill his tank with filtered water.

It didn’t take much to make him happy. Being his mom was a

vegetarian, she couldn’t abide the fact of having her little baby

eat rodents, but she did permit live goldfish. So the turtle

settled for live goldfish and Reptomin Turtle Stix.

He never grew algae on his shell because he was never

permitted outdoors and his water was filtered and changed

daily. The landlord would evict his owner if he caught wind she

had a pet turtle. This perverse story does have a happy ending

to it though.

The snapper eventually ended up at a respected private turtle

sanctuary with his own pond where he could live in the mud

and behave like a wild snapper. 

Although he probably will not have a need to hibernate in

SoCal, at least he’ll be able to grow algae on his shell and eat

fish and the occasional wild duck on private property...

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holidays?  You’ll find wonderful herp jewelry, prints, bumper

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BRAND NEW: Turtle TV—30 minutes of hilarious

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3. WORLDWIDE TURTLE STORY ROUNDUP

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MARINE TURTLES DO CRY

Philippine Daily Inquirer

CEBU CITY, Cebu, Philippines -- What many had been saying was true: marine turtles do cry. Evangeline Puao, the municipal agriculturist of the northern Cebu town of Consolacion, swore that she saw tears coming out of the eyes of a stranded sea turtle, locally known as "pawikan," while it was being prepared for release into the sea on Monday afternoon. Puao said the creature was crying when it saw the knife of Wilfredo Magale, the fisherman who accidentally caught it last Thursday. Puao said the knife was just used to clean the carapace of the turtle before it was freed. Residents cheered as the stranded turtle, weighing at least 100 kilos, was freed in Sitio Bagacay, Barangay Tayud, Consolacion, some 20 km north of here. More than 100 people, including the municipal officials and representatives of the Cebu Environment and Natural Resources Office (Cenro), witnessed the activity. Magale and his two sons were fishing off Tayud when the turtle got caught in their net. The Tayud Fishermen’s Association, of which Magale is a member, decided to report the capture of the pawikan to the municipal government and to the Cenro. The pawikan was loosely tied at the fish landing area in Sitio Bagacay while waiting for its release. Puao said they made a hole at the edge of the turtle’s shell where a tag was placed. The tag bore the names of the three fishermen who caught the turtle and the date of its capture. Because it was low tide on Monday afternoon, the marine turtle was first carried by Magale and three other fishermen to a deep portion of the sea before it was set free.

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The legend of a vicious snapping turtle

named "Old Bob" …

…turned out to be true when workers hired to scoop fish from

Laguna Lake pulled out the 50-year-old creature.

For 40 years, residents around the man-made lake had heard

rumors about the 100-pound reptile known as an alligator

snapping turtle.

"No wonder folks get excited," Sharon Paquette, vice president

of the Orange County chapter of the California Turtle and

Tortoise Club, said Thursday after the snapper surfaced.

"It’s an awesome sight to see what looks like a prehistoric

creature."

Officials didn’t know how the giant turtle, normally found in the

South and Midwest, got to the lake.

Alligator snapping turtles are the largest of all freshwater

turtles in North America, growing up to 250 pounds and living

longer than 100 years. It has a wormlike tongue used to attract

its prey, a huge head with a hooked beak and ridge-like shell.

The creature is illegal in California, Paquette said, because they

breed and multiply easily with no predator to keep their

population in check.

They’re also dangerous.

"These are powerful animals," said Paquette, who plans to send

"Old Bob" to a turtle preserve on the East Coast. "A human

could lose a foot or fingers."

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THE JOURNAL (Newcastle, UK)

SHELL SHOCK AT SPECIAL DELIVERY

Bemused Lisa Bolton got a surprise delivery when her postman

knocked on her door—a tortoise.

The 4-lb. green package was among her usual mix of bills and

letters. And it was only when the parcel started moving that

she realised it was a reptile.

Lisa, 71, a retired special needs teacher, said: "When the

postman came with a parcel last Friday I thought it must have

been for my neighbour, who is away.

"I was shocked to see it was a tortoise."

Postman Dave Jefferies, from Alnwick, found the runaway

reptile while he was on his rounds on Amerside Moor, near

Wooler.

Lisa runs the Wildlife In Need rescue centre from her home at

Shepherds Cottage in Chatton, Northumberland. Dave had

heard about Lisa’s animal magic and, knowing she  would give

the tortoise some creature comforts, he delivered it by first-

class post.

Lisa said: "The postman found it in the middle of the road and

has absolutely no idea how it got there. He knows I run a

wildlife centre and he brought it round. It must have escaped

from its owners. It is a very adventurous tortoise to be out on

its own in the countryside.

"You aren’t allowed to import tortoises these days and all

tortoises have to be bred in the country.

"I am sure there is an owner out there anxious to see this one

again."

Lisa, who runs the rescue centre with her husband John, 76, a

retired RAF officer and sculptor, has dedicated her life to

looking after wild creatures which have been injured or

abandoned.

Over the past 20 years, the mother-of-two and grandmother-

of-three has turned the gardens surrounding her home into a

haven for everything from birds - including hawks, pelicans,

gulls and geese - to horses, goats and even an earless sheep

called Lugless Douglas.

She has about 100 animals staying at the centre.

She added: "People say the North-East is the worst part of the

country for animal cruelty but there are also some of the

kindest people here. The postman didn’t have to do what he

did.

"The tortoise made a bit of mess in the back of the postman’s

van. It must have been very frightened. It is a very mobile

reptile, very fast for a tortoise. It seems to have come here by

airmail.

"We have named it Winston or Winnie depending on its sex,

because it is adventurous and doesn’t seem to let anything

faze it.

"I have fed it with lettuce, tomatoes, cabbage, apples and

plums, and put it in the aviary with a red squirrel called Hope,

but it is trying to dig its way out. I don’t know where it thinks it

is going. I have had a bit of a job containing it.

"The red squirrel is enchanted with its new friend. It has been

stealing some of its apple but they seem to be getting on."

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THE SEARCH IS ON FOR SCARFACE’S KILLER 

Needles:  Scarface was not like other desert tortoises.

He did not shrink into his shell at the sight of people, and he

often emerged from his burrow to greet visitors at the Bureau

of Land Management office.

The lumbering reptile’s friendly nature scored him trips to

entertain children and adults, and is probably what led to his

death, too.

BLM staffers found Scarface dead in his fenced enclosure Aug.

4.

They aren’t saying how the tortoise was killed because the

culprit is still at large, but Scarface’s corpse left no doubt the

slaying was malicious and cruel, said Ailica Rabas, a BLM

wildlife biologist.

The federal agency is offering a reward for information that

leads to the conviction of whoever killed the peaceful tortoise.

Harassing or killing desert tortoises, which are an endangered

species, is a crime punishable by a $100,000 fine or a year in

jail.

A driver brought Scarface to the BLM office several years ago,

fearing the reptile had wandered too close to a well-traveled

road. It is legal to carry a tortoise in imminent danger to a BLM

office, but the agency advises people to leave the slow-moving

critters alone most of the time.

Staffers dubbed the tortoise Scarface because of his lopsided

nose, which some theorized was caused by a past encounter

with an automobile. They estimated he was about 50 years old.

The animals can live to be 100.

The tortoise appeared to enjoy human contact, said Rabas, who

likened Scarface to a friendly dog or cat.

His roommates, Slow Poke and an unnamed tortoise, hid in

their burrows most of the time while Scarface crawled out to

see just about anyone who stopped by.

The others’ shyness likely saved them from suffering the same

fate as the lovable Scarface, who probably emerged from his

underground home expecting a friendly visitor only to

encounter a heartless fiend.

Scarface will be missed by many, Rabas said.

He accompanied BLM biologists to the Needles Health Fair as

well as schools and libraries in the tri-state area to educate

people about desert tortoises. Biologists chose Scarface

because of his affection for people.

"It’s not very fun to take a tortoise and show it when they are

all curled up in their shell,’ she said.

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 4. LINKS I LOVE

ROADS MAY SKEW TURTLE SEX RATIOS

Painted and snapping turtles almost all male near

major roads

http://conbio.net/SCB/Services/Tips/2004-8-Aug.cfm#A1

http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/docs/1995/Suppl-7/crews.html

Box Turtle Sex Determination

http://www.boxturtlesite.org/malefemale.html

The Daily Egg: Turtle Sex

http://www.thegoosesnest.com/Blogs/thedailyegg/2004/09/turtle-sex.html

EcoViews

http://www.uga.edu/srelherp/ecoview/Eco11.htm

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4. Just for Fun

Mac the Turtle

by Barb "Cricket" DeNamur.  

(sung to: Hickory, Dickory Dock)

There once was a turtle named Mac

Who carried a shell on his back.

Sometimes he’d hide; curl up inside,

So animals wouldn’t attack.

Now, Mac likes to walk sort of slow,

Munching on leaves as he goes;

Sometimes a bug, even a slug,

While moving his head to and fro.

Mac goes to the pond for a drink

And uses it for a sink,

Splashes his nose, washes his toes,

Then he sits in the mud to think.

If a mosquito comes by,

Or maybe a dragonfly,

He’ll snap and snap, and that is that

’Cause Mac is a turtle that’s why.

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YOU KNOW YOU’RE A HERPER*…

WHEN YOU DREAM IN GREEN.

*Reptile & amphibian lover

Laugh-out-loud quips and quotes

from herpers like you

on what it’s like to be a herper

You know you’re a herper when…

…at around 9 years old, you put a toad on your tongue

to impress your friends.

…Air Cargo employees refer to you as "The Crocodile Hunter."

…your spouse wishes he’d grow a shell so he’d get the

same preferential treatment as your turtles.

WHEN YOU DREAM IN GREEN is available only from

www.HerpArts.com. Get your copy today—it’s a great

 gift—for you and your herper friends!

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DON’T MISS THE

BIG SALE AT THE TURTLE WIFE STORE—

Now Through November 16

Jr. raglans, baseball jerseys, hooded sweatshirts,

Thongs, mugs, tile boxes, mouse pads and greeting

Cards are all On Sale! 

Check out the "Party Hearty" snapping turtle products,

Along with tee shirts, tote bags and more that feature

To get to the T-Wife Store, Go to Turtle Wife Store.

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*** ORGANIZATIONS THAT HELP TURTLES *** 

HERPDIGEST: A Weekly Electronic Newsletter on the

Latest News on Reptile and Amphibian Science and

Conservation. A nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization. Allen

Salzberg, Editor/Publisher  www.herpdigest.org

THE NEW YORK TURTLE & TORTOISE SOCIETY: A nonprofit

501(c)(3) organization dedicated to the conservation,

preservation of habitat, and the promotion of proper husbandry

and captive propagation of turtles and tortoises.  www.nytts.org

TURTLE HOMES: A nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization that finds

new homes for turtles and tortoises that cannot be returned to

the wild.  www.turtlehomes.org

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CONFESSIONS OF A TURTLE WIFE

The hilarious story of a turtle-challenged

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Turtle Wife’s Newsletter  © 2004 Turtlewife.com