Hi Box Turtle fans.

I'm new to the forum and new to turtles in general. I have enjoyed reading through the forum and soaking up info.

Does anyone out there live in my area?

Anyway, I could sure use some help and suggestions. We aquired our first box turtle around mid October of last year. She came to us quite by accident as she just suddenly appeared in our yard. Sice I know we are way to far north for her to be native I can only guess that she was either "released" by a well meaning pet owner that got tired of her or she was dumped here on purpose by someone who knows we are suckers for rescues. We live on a farm and our nearest neighbors are 2 wooded miles away and it got down to 17 degrees the night she showed up so all I can say is she is probably just lucky to be alive.

I have raised cornsnakes, ball pythons and a couple of iguannas in the past and used to subscribe to "Reptiles" magazine so I knew right away she was not a native turtle but it took me several days of searching the internet before we were able to identify what kind of turtle she was and at first I thought she was a tortios. I now know she is an adult female western box turtle. I'm pretty sure she is an ornate but she could be a desert.

I'm concerend because at first she was eating very well. Never boxed up or seemed afraid of us in any way and she sure knew what a food bowl was for. After a while though she stopped eating and has been pretty depressed. From what I have read I can only assume that she would really like to hybernate but I'm afraid to let her considering our little knowledge on the subject and I'm afraid we may have stressed her quite a bit in an effort to get her eating again before we realized what was likely going on.

We plan to build an outdoor enclosure for her this summer but for now we have set her up in the largest area we have room for....the bathtub in our spare bathroom. I have a basking lamp, pool big enough for a good soak and about 4 inches of bed-a-beast/moss/sand/aspen bark substrate. She has a half round of bark for a cave to hide in.

Before she stopped eating we were feeding fruits, berries, veggies, canned dog food, earthworms, mealworm, crickets and a few different kinds of comercial box turtle diets. We also ordered some turtle brittle and suppliments from Carolina pet supply and all the insects were dusted in reptivite.

I'm concerened that our very northern climate will not allow us to keep her outside much even in the summer. Our night time temps rarely stay above 65 degrees and we don't have many days that reach 80 degrees or higher. I'm thinking we will need a very well set up indoor terrarium with a place outside for regular "field tripps" only when the weather is warm enough.

Well, I know its a long post but I hope someone can help us. My 9 year old son just adores his "Yertle the turtle" and we don't want her to die.

Glenna in North Idaho

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