Snappin' Turtle

It is egg laying time up here for turtles. They begin to cross roads and look for the right place to lay their eggs. Often they think that our driveway is a good spot.

Usually we get the box turtle or the painted turtle, but last week, we had a snapping turtle visit. At this point, we just looked and tried to get it to snap a stick, but it wouldn't snap. So we just assumed that it might be snapper.

Look at that tail. It looks just like a dinosaur tail. Well, later that night, I found out that it was indeed a snapping turtle. I was in the basement working on a project late. Everyone else was sensibly asleep. I heard a bump bump and thought that the turtle had bumped into the wood surrounding our window well. I had just thought, "I hope that stupid turtle doesn't fall in our window well". Then I heard scrambling on the the rocks in our window well. Yes she had fallen in.

So I grabbed a handy 5 gallon bucket and went to put the turtle in it. The turtle would have nothing to do with that and snapped at me. Their necks shoot out at least 8 or so inches! I thought I would wait until morning when I would have lots of light. Then she started scrambling again and I thought she would scratch the window or the frame or dig up a lot of sand. I got on the Internet at 11 pm and found out how to move a snapper.

I got a large storage tote and a big grain shovel that we use for snow removal. I used the shovel to move her into the tote. She was not pleased and bit the shovel. But I managed to get her in and let her go near our pond in hopes that she wouldn't come back again.

When I told the children the next morning, they asked why I hadn't gotten a movie of it. When I explained that I was kinda busy with the turtle, one of them suggested that I should have put the camera on the tripod. Maybe next time.