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Here are three hatchling spotted turtles. One has
very few spots, another is average and the third is more colorful.
Each turtle had different parents
A female strolling across a hiking path with
intentions to find a new home.
Dark pigment on the chin shows this turtle is a male.
Orange pigment on the chin shows this turtle is a
female.
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Description:
The Spotted turtle is one of the smallest full sized turtles
found with in the United States. It ranges in size from 4
inches to approximately 5 1/4 inches. A Spotted turtle's
shell is solid black covered with yellow spots. The number
of spots varies depending on the turtle's age. Older turtles
tend to have a lot more spots, sometimes over 125 scattered
across their shell and face, whereas younger turtles will
have just a few
spots, often just one per scute. There have even been
reports of spotted turtles having a completely black shell
without one spot, these turtles are known as melanistic
spotted turtles. The spots usually grow in numbers as a
juvenile ages. Sometimes when an adult ages to near death,
some spots will fade. A spotted turtle's hingeless plastron
is yellow and orange with some blotches of black. The legs
are mainly black with red or orange mixed in with the yellow
spots and in rare occasions you might find some white in
there. Wild spotted turtles will sometimes have a brown
tinted shell covering the original black shell with yellow
spots; this is caused by the turtle living in high acidic
cedar swamps or cranberry bogs containing large amounts of
iron. Pealing of the existing scutes lightly and carefully
can easily clean the shell. This will expose some of the
spots hidden under the tinted shell.
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Sex:
Sex is easily determined in spotted turtle adults;
males have a dark (black) pigmented chin, whereas the female
will have a much brighter orange or reddish-pigmented chin.
The males also have a longer thicker tail and the females
have a shorter thin tail. If you look on the plastron
(bottom) of the turtle's shell you will see a flatter smooth
surface if its a female and a concave or slight indentation
if its a male. The males tend to have this indentation to
help breeding, allowing the male to cling to the female as
she moves rapidly through the water trying to escape the
male. In most adults, males will appear to have darker
looking eyes, like a brownish color. And the females will
have an orangish colored eye. |
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Distribution:
Spotted turtles are found in two regions, one being along
the whole Atlantic coastal plain which includes, northern
Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia,
Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, New York, Massachusetts,
Connecticut, Rhode Island, southern New Hampshire, southern
Vermont and Southern Maine. The other region being
Pennsylvania, northern Ohio, Indiana, southern Quebec,
southern Ontario through to northeastern Illinois and
western Michigan. |
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Habitat:
They are found in a wide variety of habitat. However, they
are most frequently seen in shallow, well-vegetated
wetlands. You also see them in either marshes, cedar swamps,
cranberry bogs, fens, tamarack swamps, sedge meadows,
cattail marshes, wet cow pastures, sphagnum bogs, slow
moving woodland streams, roadway ditches, puddles and along
the shoreline of a largely vegetated lake where the water
tends to be shallower. It is usually hard to see spotted
turtles actually bask on a log in front of you in the wild.
About 9 out of 10 turtles while basking will spot you before
you spot them. The turtle usually then dives down and hides
in the muddy bottom under leaves and pine needles. Spotted
turtles are almost always found in well-vegetated bodies of
water because there is usually a large source of food
available. It is very common to see turtles travel in cedar
swamps and streams in multiple numbers. I have seen large
numbers of about 25-35 adults traveling together depending
on their food source. They will stay in one small area for
like a week or until the food is low and then move on to
another area where it is abundant. During the process of
movement, some turtles leave the group and new turtles
arrive. I have witnessed a lot of their actions in heavily
wooded areas. It is very unusual to find a spotted by
itself; they are almost always traveling together.
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Housing: Spotted
turtles should be kept in shallow waters around 4-6 inches
deep as spotted turtles are poor swimmers. It is not good
to keep them in deeper water unless you know what you are
really doing and have experience. The reason for this is
because you want the spotted turtle to have easy access to
get air as there are always many reports of
spotted turtles drowning in people's ponds, tanks or other
enclosures. Always keep your water clean which means clear
and if you can cool. Warm water feeds ammonia which causes
them to get sick quite often. Ammonia comes from the waste
from spotteds turtles. Plenty of oxygen flow can place good
bacteria in the water which fights ammonia. In order to
reduce stress on your turtle, avoid constant changing of
their enclosure. Turtleland tubs make great enclosures for a
spotted group of about 1.4. A basking log is always
something you should have allowing your turtle to climb out
of the water and completely dry off to prevent fungus growth
on their skin and shell. A heat lamp should be placed about
1 foot away from the log with a 100watt heat bulb which can
be purchased at a local pet store. Submersible filters can
also be purchased at your local pet store to help keep your
water cleaner |
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Feeding:
Spotted turtles feed on a variety of things. They are mainly
carnivorous; in fact I rarely see them eat greens. However,
some turtles will consistently feed on greens, such as
romaine lettuce or other sources of vegetation that might
grow in your pond. Based on what I have studied with my
spotted, I have noticed that they prefer other foods such as
insects and other meat sources. The spotted that I keep are
fed earthworms, wax worms, mealworms, crickets, tadpoles,
chicken, crab, turkey, bacon, beef, reptomin and trout chow.
One thing I have seen my spotted turtles eat which totally
surprised me, is blueberries. In the wild, they feed on just
about anything small enough that lives or falls in the water
and can fit in their mouth. This means caterpillars, snails,
slugs, dragonflies, spiders, worms, fish, small frogs,
mollusks, crustaceans, amphibian eggs, carrion, baby birds,
etc. For the most part, I feed my turtles daily, however it
is all right if I miss a day here and there if I cant be
home to do so. I have even experienced a year where I fed
them every other day and had more eggs that year. I am just
afraid that Darwin?s theory of Natural Selection, "the
survival of the fittest," will take over and my weaker
spotted might not get a chance to eat. Spotted turtles will
sometimes feed very heavily on chicken, reptomin, and beef.
Then all of a sudden stop eating completely. At this point,
you should start offering new types of food, such as
earthworms, crickets, greens and blueberries. Spotted
turtles in the wild feed from late March through late
October and sometimes even early November. Mine, which are
located in New Jersey, stop eating around the end of
October. They stay active for about a few weeks afterwards,
which gives their system a chance to empty out and prepare
for hibernation. A turtle's stomach must be empty prior to
being in a full state of hibernation. If it is not empty,
the food will eventually rot in their stomach, possibly
killing the turtle. |
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Breeding:
Spotted turtles breed in early spring and late fall when
water temperatures are cooler. For the best breeding, it is
always a good idea to hibernate the species although it is
not a necessity for these turtles in order to produce
fertile eggs. Keeping your males separate from your females
is also a good idea. To simulate early spring and late fall
in your enclosure, its good to create something in a
basement or garage during these months so the water temp in
their enclosure is cold. 40-55 seem to be the best breeding
temps for your water. During breeding season, it is best to
leave the turtles alone as much as possible, the more you
pass by or are near the enclosure the more uncomfortable the
turtle becomes. When breeding occurs you will see that the
male will try to mount the female by climbing on top of her
shell while his tail moves towards
hers. The breeding session may take as few as 1 minute or
as long as several hours. The best is to just keep them
together for about a week to assure she is gravid. Once
this occurs, the eggs may develop in as few as 15 days to
about a month later. At that time the female will begin to
try to escape her enclosure non stop. She will try climbing
the sides of the aquarium or pen looking for a suitable egg
laying site. At this time you can remove the turtle and
place her in an area where there is a lot of soil, sunlight
and plants. Spotted turtles are likely to lay their eggs at
the base of a tall grass where they can hide underneath the
blades of grass while depositing eggs. |
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Incubation:
like all turtles, the temperature in which the eggs are
incubated can determine sex in babies. Eggs incubated at
temperatures between 75 degrees and 80 degrees will produce
all males. Eggs incubated at temperatures between 81 degrees
and 84 degrees will produce a mix of males and females and
eggs incubated at temperatures between 85 degrees and 89
degrees produce all females. A few times I have incubated
eggs at around 90-92 degrees by mistake. These eggs produced
many different kinds of morphs. A spotted with no eyes, a
siamese spotted, an amelanistic spotted and even an albino.
Most of these died in the egg before using up their egg sac
and breaking free which was very devastating. When
incubating at high temperatures, you will often run across
babies with irregular scutes. When you see irregular scutes
on turtles, you almost know immediately that it is a female.
Once in a blue moon you will get a male with irregular
shaped scutes. Incubation can last from around 60 days to
about 90 days when incubated artificially. Spotted turtle
eggs in the wild have been known to hatch anywhere from 60
days in southern locations such as South Carolina to 125
days in northern locations such as Maine. However in some
areas, depending on elevation, the babies may over-winter
inside the egg and hatch the following spring. I tend to
keep eggs that still look good in the incubator until at
least 140 days have past, just to be 100% sure they wont
hatch. |
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Hatchlings:
When spotted turtle babies first emerge from their little
white egg, they usually measure about an inch in length.
Most cases after they break through the eggshell, they will
sit in the egg for a few days absorbing their egg sac. Some
spotted turtles climb right out of their egg even if they
still have a large yolk sac. When your spotted turtle
emerges from the egg, it is very important that you pick it
up gently and look underneath on its stomach. You will
either see a small, medium or large egg sac. At this time,
it is ideal that you mist the egg sac with a spray bottle to
make sure that all the substrate is off of the turtle.
Sometimes, the egg sac can get very dirty and cause the egg
sac to become infected and eventually kill the hatchling.
Hatchling spotted turtles are very fragile turtles, they
will usually start feeding right away if kept in a safe
environment. It is recommended that babies are set up in
Tupperware bins or aquariums that is no more than an inch
deep and provided with some aquatic plants. I set my babies
up in a ten-gallon aquarium with 2 water hyacinths at 1.5
inches in depth. I also use plenty of artificial plants as
well. If the water depth is over 1 inch in depth, any
plants, sticks, leaves or mosses should be used to fill
empty space in the water, due to the fact spotted turtles
are very poor swimmers and therefore need something to grab
onto to pull themselves to the top for air. The addition of
these live or plastic water plants add to the sense of
security for the animals. The live plants may provide an
additional food source. Of course as your spotted turtle
grows in size, the habitat and water depth should be
increased. A hatchling's spots
are determined through genetics. If you are wondering
whether they will be pretty or ugly as adults, look at their
parents. If they are going to be pretty at adulthood, you
should see a large bright spot on each scute. As the turtle
ages, more and more little spots will appear scattered
across the shell. It is rare to see two not so colorful
adults produce beautiful babies. Most cases all the babies
from the same nest will look and appear identical.
Keeping a baby turtle's water clean is extremely important.
When a baby turtle gets sick, there is not too much you can
do for it because they are so small and fragile. If a baby
spotted turtle gets a respiratory infection, the only thing
you can do is separate it and keep its water very clean.
Another method you can try is a respiratory powder used on
birds. The powder can be mixed with the spotted turtle's
water after dehydrating the turtle a little bit by keeping
it out of water for an entire day. Sometimes this works and
sometimes it doesn't, but it is worth a shot since there is
almost nothing else you can do. If a baby turtle stops
eating, try heating up the water a little bit, either by
putting the heat lamp closer or by adding a water heater. If
it doesn't eat the brand name foods, I would strongly
suggest feeding nothing but live insects or meats such as
chicken or beef. In a baby spotted turtle's enclosure, the
turtles will usually hide in the roots of the plant until
offered live blood or black worms, which move freely through
the water grabbing the turtle?s attention. I would feed them
blood / black worms at first just to get an appetite going
on the little guys. I would also mix in some Reptomin
sticks, which have a worm-like structure look to it. Baby
spotted turtles will also feed on small crickets, mealworms,
guppies, and meats, such as chicken or beef. I try to only
feed my hatchlings Reptomin, as Reptomin contains the proper
nutrition baby turtles need to grow and remain healthy.
Sometimes when a baby turtle is fed excessive mealworms,
crickets or wax worms, the turtle will strictly eat them and
nothing else, which prevents the turtle from getting the
proper nutrients it needs to thrive. In the long run the
turtle will probably die if it only eats strictly one
certain food with exception to Reptomin and trout chow. I
have had baby turtles that only ate mealworms, I have had
baby turtles that only ate wax worms and I have had baby
turtles that only ate crickets. All eventually died. Other
foods I have seen my hatchlings go crazy for are krill,
freeze dried shrimp, tuna, hotdogs and turkey bacon cut very
small. Bruce and Zack Russo, friends of mine, feed their
hatchlings ghost shrimp. Even though baby turtles feed on a
variety of things, I would recommend sticking with Reptomin
and trout chow. It is very important that you monitor your
turtle when feeding it and pay close attention to what foods
it is feeding on. Lighting is very important with baby
turtles. A heat bulb is a mandatory item needed to keep a
baby turtle's appetite heavy. Hatchlings kept below 70
degrees most often stop eating and eventually die.
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AL ROACH