Weekend of March 30, 2018: A Baby Snapper

On March 28, 2018, Danae found this little fella in her garage. Thanks to her good eye, this tiny snapping turtle wasn’t smooshed by a tire. It was sooo little!

29572219_10211115747984974_6314140343482392586_n — Photo: Danae Reynolds

Viviana, SLAC mentor and wildlife conservationist, explained to us that not much is known about common snapping turtles in this part of the country because all the studies she’s aware of are from the northeast and Canada. This has made her want to gather and collect data on this species to see if/how Texas snappers differ.

With that in mind, Danae put in a speed call to Viviana as soon as she found the wayward baby. While we waited for Vivi to come out and examine the li’l one, she forwarded this educational information to us:

Excerpt from the book: Turtles of the United States and Canada – Ernst, Lovich, Barbour

Reproduction:

Male Chelydra mature at 4 to 5 years of age and Plastron lengths of 149-155 mm

Suggests that female Chelydra in Tennessee mature at about 145mm plastron length.

Most clutches of eggs are deposited between May and June and only 1 clutch per year.

Snapping turtle eggs incubated at 20c produce female

Eggs incubated at 21-22c produce both male and female

Eggs incubated at 23c to 24 c produce only male

Eggs at 25 -28c produce both sexes but predominately males at the lower end of this range.

Eggs at 29 to 31c produce only female

Emergence of the nest normally occurs from mid-Aug to early Oct ( now this is talking northeast parts of the US)

but maybe earlier in the south OR delayed until the following spring.

After emerging hatchlings often bury themselves in soil near the nest or crawl under leaf litter or debris.

Hatchlings are about 24-31mm in carapace length and 22-29 mm CW total weight of about 5-9g

(S)he was too small to tag, and it wasn’t yet possible to determine its gender…

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…but Viviana pointed out that it was so newly hatched that its umbilical scar was visible, which was a really cool thing to see.

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The girls helped Viviana document the turtle’s measurements (please note: the masked SLAC-ker is not about to rob a train; she was taking antibiotics for streptococcus and didn’t want to make anyone else sick).

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Note the can of Lysol™ on the table. And, yes, the calipers used to measure this tiny turtle were a bit large. We always follow Theodore Roosevelt’s advice and do what we can with what we have where we are.

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This was right about the time Viviana started teaching the girls how to properly photograph the specimens they find in their natural habitats. It’s easy to see the difference between this photo (taken by the person writing this post)… DSCN8382

…and Viviana’s photo taken moments later. For what it’s worth, the person writing this post also decided that if this turtle were a rapper, its name would be Li’l Snappy, so it’s good the girls have a proper wildlife conservationist to guide them. 10348645_10107129974695590_8758623787559454918_o

After they documented everything they could about Li’l Snappy, they did what all good wildlife conservationists do, they let him go.

But the fun wasn’t over. Our lizard whisperer might’ve been sick, but she was still a magnet for anoles and spiny lizards (seriously, they FLOCK to the kid). She ended up with half a dozen in her hands, and Vivi demonstrated to all the girls how to get the best pictures of them. IMG_20180330_182705191

Here are the results of the photoshoot:
29355233_10107129974960060_443199256904780470_o 29662651_10107129975344290_3773863988965489431_o 29662801_10107129975044890_2333866872564904448_o 29665058_10107129974710560_2799082503753789686_o