FieldHerpForum

The "Which Missouri Nerodia?" game was so fun that I've come up with a sequel.

Here's a photo of a turtle pile from a small pond just off the lake from which the mystery Nerodia was posed. This is in Perry County, southeastern Missouri.

The ones on the right look like red-eared sliders to me. But are all of these the same species? The one on the far left doesn't have the obvious head stripes and red patch of the others, and it's far smaller than the big one on the right, so it doesn't seem like it can just be an old, faded individual.



Any pond turtle experts out there?

John

LOL, this is getting old now. Sipedon is the watersnake ID, and the turt IDs are two red-eared sliders on the fringes, with painted turts in the middle.

Shane

The ones on the far right and the one on the left are definately Red EarSliders the turtles in the middle look to be Western Painted Turtles, Southerns will have a red stripe down the back.

The RES on the left is melanistic Ive seen them this color from 5 inches and up heres a pic of a medium sized one overall brown coloration, and Ive also seen completely black.




Heres a pic of a southern painted turtle showing the distinct red line




Hope that helps.

Matt

Not even close.........can't say I've seen a five-incher that was lacking color, but something to keep an eye out for I guess.

Shane

Thanks everyone. It's a little interesting that Perry county is in the small swath of Missouri that's shown as between the range of the western painted turtle further north and the southern painted turtle further south. At least, according to Conant & Collins, as well as http://mdc.mo.gov/nathis/herpetol/turtles/.

John

Take it with a grain of salt. Both references seem to indicate that painted turts can't cross a river, and otherwise can't crawl over land...........I'd chalk it up to bad sampling and maps that were intended to be much better than something of Audubon quality.........definitely much better, but some flaws as well. Submit your finds.......it will be hard to disprove that they are in fact painted turdles

Shane