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Eastern Box Turtle
Terrapene carolina carolina
36.5409, -87.983
Field Notes
Description:
Male Box Turtle, Identified by the red eyes, concave plastron, and position of the cloaca. Box turtles have a hinged plastron enabling them to completely close up their shells. When frightened they pretend to be rocks, and generally blend in. This is the state reptile of Tennessee!
Habitat:
Upland forest with lots of oaks and hickories.
Notes:
I spotted this one while I was driving some back roads in LBL doing acoustic surveys of bat populations.By the time I finished checking this guy out, he was in no mood for photographs and closed hismself in.
This turtle had more yellow on his shell then almost any other that I have seen. The camera in my phone does not do it justice. I counted the annuli on the first pleural scute and estimate this turtle to be about 13 years old....but that is not exact.
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