Posted by:
vidusa
at Thu Jun 26 09:26:54 2003 [ Email Message ] [ Show All Posts by vidusa ]
Any box turtle you find on the road, live or dead, you can assume it to be "dead". If you put it back in the neighborhood, it WILL try crossing the road again, and next time you will probably not be there. If its not the road, some neighborhood kid will just take it home and put it in a box or an aquarium full of water. You can't release it in another park, because box turtles are territorial and have taken years to learn their environment. If you put it elsewhere, it will wonder, not eat enought to survive the winter, and 80% of the time (from a PA study) will die. So, your choices: 1) put it in the lot and let it get hit by a car, 2) let a kid find it, 3) take it to a park somewhere else and let it die of starvation or other aliment.
I remember seeing box turtles on road ways all time as a kid, especially one 60 mi road between philly and the shore. Past 10 years, I had not seen any. Last weekend, I found one! With its head crushed by a car! The point is, box turtles that cross roads are likely to be killed. A turtle must survive 50 years and produce 100s of eggs, for one or two to survive to adulthood. Disrupted environments like new housing units, increase the size of their predator population reducing likely hood of them living to adulthood. Predators like possums, skunks, raccoons, crows, mice, chipmunks, etc all flourish near human habitats. Also, road mortality. These variable disrupt the delicate natural balance between turtle and nature and in 100 years, there will not be a box turtle population there no matter what. The construction already destroyed the long-term survivablity of the turtle populations in that area. My recommendation: give it to someone who breeds them so their offspring can reduce pressures to catch them.
Your home does not have suitable humidity for the box turtle. It will eventually become ill and die if not provided with a damp substrate and 70-80 humidity.
I had a friend who beleived like many here about keeping them in wild if found on a road. Two instances changed his mind. 1st was a turtle that he put back in the woods every week. One day he left to work late, and found it dead in the street. Another time he was driving to work, saw a box turtle in the street from far away, pulled over to get it, but next group of cars came, none stop, and one swerved to kill it near the shoulder of the road. Now, he sees my point. How will you feel to see that same turtle dead on the same road you found it? Its your choice.
Mark
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Do not release it - vidusa, Thu Jun 26 09:26:54 2003