Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Here's a couple of pictures, as best and close as I could get, of my two three-toed's tails.

The boxie on the left is male, we know, b/c he was the one doing the mounting, as recently as this morning. The one on the right and in the single pic is the one I and everyone are going back and forth on the sex of. It's tail is so short, I had to pry it out from it's shell with a stick and barely got the shot off before it retreated again. I hope these pics can help clear up its sex. Thanks all!

I would say it looks like you have a pair, although not sure that either of them look fully mature, but I guess you won't know for sure untill if and when "she" lays eggs, huh.
That's my oppinion others may vary.
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Jeff Benfer
You'll get your regius's to the wall, man!
1.0 pastel Python regius
0.1 mojave Python regius
0.1 normal Python regius
0.2 Terrapene carolina thriunguis
2.3 Terrapene carolina carolina
4.1 Kinosternon baurii
1.1 Malaclemys terrapin terrapin
2.1 Ambystoma tigrinum
2.2 het albino and anerythristicThamnophis sirtalis parietalis
1.0 anerythristic Thamnophis sirtalis parietalis
1.1 Iowa snow Thamnophis radix
1.1 heterozygous for amelanistic,carmel, and stripe Pantherophis guttatus
0.1 anerythristic motley Pantherophis guttatus

The one on the left is still growing, so he's barely a young adult. You can see distinct growth rings and brand new pink growth along the central seam of his plastron. The one on the right is an old turtle, completely finished growing. Her plastron is perfectly smooth and all traces of growth rings have been worn off, which takes a lot of years to accomplish. She could be 35 or 80, no way to tell, unless you have a record of when she hatched.

Thanks both of you. My mind was pretty sure it was a female after seeing that tale compared to the male's, and after being mounted twice. So thanks for confirming.

I hope she's not 80; I wish I did have a way of knowing how old she is. I adopted her from a mother and daughter who rescued her from some pretty horrible conditions, and who knows how long she's been in captivity. Wish I knew that too, I mean, if she was just taken from the wild recently, I would absolutely return her, but then again she is really outgoing, only boxes up when she's startled, eats in front of you, takes food from your hand, etc., so I think she's been in captivity for some reasonable amount of time. Anyway, hope she's with me for a while. She's so pretty with her orange face and yellow legs. She has quite a personality too. She likes to just hang out in the grass long after the other three-toed and the two easterns have gone hiding in the morning.

Yes, I would agree with those assesments mj, but the one on the left is in my oppinion most likely raised from hatchling in captivity and the one on the right was wild from day one untill it was caught and became captive. My neighbor has a little 3 inch three toed that is wild caught the shows all those wear indicators that you describe, whereas my 8yr old 5 inch CBBs don't, so there is defitately a difference in how a wild caught verses a CBB show age. One things for certain the likely CBB on the left is not done growing his penis. I hope the one on the right lays eggs for you Curtis, good luck with them.
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Jeff Benfer
You'll get your regius's to the wall, man!
1.0 pastel Python regius
0.1 mojave Python regius
0.1 normal Python regius
0.2 Terrapene carolina thriunguis
2.3 Terrapene carolina carolina
4.1 Kinosternon baurii
1.1 Malaclemys terrapin terrapin
2.1 Ambystoma tigrinum
2.2 het albino and anerythristicThamnophis sirtalis parietalis
1.0 anerythristic Thamnophis sirtalis parietalis
1.1 Iowa snow Thamnophis radix
1.1 heterozygous for amelanistic,carmel, and stripe Pantherophis guttatus
0.1 anerythristic motley Pantherophis guttatus

Not intending to be argumentative here, but based on those pictures alone, you can't tell anything about whether the one on the left was captive raised or wild raised. He has very clear annuli, which just indicates he has gone through what would be a normal annual temperature cycle, where the growth has stopped during the winter and started again in the warm weather. Each of those distinct lines is where the growth stops one year and starts again the next year. If anything, he looks more like a wild turtle that has hibernated, rather than a captive one that's been allowed to stay warm all year. Captive turtles that are hibernated each year generally display the same kind of annuli that wild ones do, so he could be one that falls into that category. If he was a captive raised turtle that stayed warm and was fed all year around, the annuli wouldn't be as clear and wouldn't necessarily correlate with an annual growth cycle because some growth would continue during the winter. Those annuli gradually wear down and eventually disappear, first on the plastron because of the greater level of friction it encounters while a turtle drags it's belly across the ground, but eventually the carapacial annuli wear away too. Really old turtles eventually take on a completely smooth appearance (like the one on the right), whether they are wild or captive. You hardly ever see ones that are that smooth, wild or captive, because they usually die or get killed before they get to look like that. You would never expect to see a completely smooth three inch box turtle with no trace of growth lines, unless it's growth was stunted for one reason or another and it managed to live a very long time in spite of it.

mj,
I think if you scroll down and look at the past several posts by Curtis you will learn a great deal about where I am coming from, those were not the first pictures he has posted of those two turtles, it is very clear from the other pictures, I think you will have a different view, nothing you said is untrue, but you are argueing with yourself not knowing the whole story and whole picture literally. Take a step back, a deep breath, and scroll down.
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Jeff Benfer
You'll get your regius's to the wall, man!
1.0 pastel Python regius
1.1 mojave Python regius
0.1 normal Python regius
1.3 Terrapene carolina thriunguis
2.3 Terrapene carolina carolina
4.1 Kinosternon baurii
1.1 Malaclemys terrapin terrapin
2.2 double het albino and anerythristicThamnophis sirtalis parietalis
1.0 anerythristic Thamnophis sirtalis parietalis
2.2 Iowa snow Thamnophis radix
0.1 het Christmas albino Thamnophis radix
1.1 double het cherry erythristic, albino Thamnophis sirtalis sirtalis
1.1 melanistic Thamnophis sirtalis sirtalis
1.1 triple heterozygous for amelanistic,carmel, and stripe Pantherophis guttatus
0.1 anerythristic motley Pantherophis guttatus
0.1 Okeetee Pantherophis guttatus

I saw the earlier posts, but thanks for the concern over my breathing. I'm pretty old and you never know when it might just stop altogether. All the photos just show an old female and a young male. The pyramidding you referred to on the male isn't pyramidding at all; it's just a series of normal growth annuli that have nothing to do with captive vs. wild. The female doesn't have any because she's much older and they've worn off. I pick up wild box turtles all the time that have very clear growth rings, just like the young male. I picked this young male out of the road around the corner from my house yesterday morning. The rings are clear enough that you can make a good estimate about his age, but he has no pyramidding. I didn't mean to butt into the conversation, but this is a topic that I find very interesting and it's something that I've been studying informally for a very long time so I thought I'd chime in.

I'm going to dissagree with you on the slight pyrimiding and other visual cues, and say I still think Curtis's young male was "likely" CBB and the other one was raised wild and leave it at that. One thing we agree on is the male is young and probably not done growing and may continue to mature or change in appearance and the "likely female" is older and probably done growing and will not change in appearance. The growth rings you refer to in the diagram look very convincing, and for that particular individual might hold up, but it's generally probably not that simple, there can be multiple grown rings due to enviromental conditions, food availablity, ect. in one year, and some years no dissernable grow rings. The general concensus from my readings of the studies that have been done is that growth rings are not a very reliable and accurate way to age boxies or other turtles and torts either for that matter, even for young animals, and older animals completely N/A a 45 yr old won't have 45 rings. Good discussion anyway, even though we may not be in 100% aggreament, and I'm not saying i'm right but those are my views and oppinions, I could be wrong.
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Jeff Benfer
You'll get your regius's to the wall, man!
1.0 pastel Python regius
1.1 mojave Python regius
0.1 normal Python regius
1.3 Terrapene carolina thriunguis
2.3 Terrapene carolina carolina
4.1 Kinosternon baurii
1.1 Malaclemys terrapin terrapin
2.2 double het albino and anerythristicThamnophis sirtalis parietalis
1.0 anerythristic Thamnophis sirtalis parietalis
2.2 Iowa snow Thamnophis radix
0.1 het Christmas albino Thamnophis radix
1.1 double het cherry erythristic, albino Thamnophis sirtalis sirtalis
1.1 melanistic Thamnophis sirtalis sirtalis
1.1 triple heterozygous for amelanistic,carmel, and stripe Pantherophis guttatus
0.1 anerythristic motley Pantherophis guttatus
0.1 Okeetee Pantherophis guttatus

The older turtle on the right is likely a female and the younger one has a short tail for a male, but is likely a male from the behaviors you have viewed.

My adult male three-toeds have quite a bit longer tails and much more muscular, but perhaps your turtle is still growing and it will attain a more robust tail in the near future It reminds me of the saying- my turtle's tail bigger than your turtle's tail- or was that something else? Tess