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Terrapene carolina triunguis
Young male. Light brown shell with orange markings coming in on the front legs and neck.
Found crossing the road in a mostly oak forest.
Spotted on May 29, 2014
Submitted on Jun 23, 2014
3 Comments
Thanks Hema!
Jamie, I can't answer all of these, but I can tell you what I know. Adult males do have very red/orange spots all over the legs and neck with bright red eyes. This guy was still fairly small, but if it were a female it would not have any of the orange on the body like this guy does. So that is how we know it's a young male. And yes, males do have a concave plastron, it helps them to be able to sit on the female better during mating. You can see it in this photo if you look between my thumb and pointer finger. Many turtles can live to be 100, but it's very rare for box turtles. They don't reach sexual maturity until 9-10, and live expectancy is somewhere between 30-50 years usually. I have never heard that box turtles are territorial at all, so I can't say much on that one. Hope this helped.
I've heard so many ways to tell the gender of a box turtle that I've become confused. I have quite a few questions about them where everyone answers different things, I'm sure you can answer some. First off I've been told that males always have red or orange eyes a concave plastron and a carapace that is very slanted towards the back. I've also heard that box turtles can live to be a hundred (i don't believe that) I've heard they only live to be 15 too. lastly I've heard that box turtles are highly territorial and must be placed back exactly where they were found, but other people say they are very nomadic. Can you answer some of these?
Superb!!