Eastern Box Turtle (Terrapene carolina carolina)

Physical Description:  Eastern Box Turtles can be identified by their high domed shell with variable brown, yellow, black, and orange patterns intermixed. They have a hinged plastron, or bottom of the shell, that allows them to hide and seal themselves away from predators. This hinge gives them their name, as they box themselves up. Males typically have red eyes, and females have brown eyes, with both growing 4-6 inches long on average. A female will have a flat plastron, including the hinge, while males is slightly concave, which aids in reproduction.
 
Habitat: They live in woodlands, forests, fields, or along stream banks. They will often move into the fields during the day to bask in the warmth, before retreating for cover later in the evening.
 
Range: They are found in the United States east of the Mississippi River and south of the Great Lakes, down into Mexico.
 
Diet: Young eat earthworms, slugs and snails, while adults dine on berries, fruit, fungi (can eat varieties poisonous to humans), insects, crayfish and bivalves.
 
Lifespan: The Eastern Box Turtle lives 50 years on average, with some living upwards of 100 years or older.
 
Social Structure: They are a solitary animal outside of the mating period. Females will dig nests from May through July and lay 2-8 eggs. They can lay 5-10 clutches per year. The eggs will incubate for 70 -114 days, and they have temperature dependent sex determination. Males will hatch if the nest is 82 degrees or less; females will hatch at 93 degrees, with a mix hatching between 83 and 92 degrees.

Status: Vulnerable1
 
Other: Individual animals over 100 years old have served as “living records” with Native American fathers and then sons carving their names on the same shell.

1 https://www.iucnredlist.org/fr/species/21641/97428179

This animal participates in educational programs and is not on public display.