Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Does anyone elses Box turtles find the muddiest spot in the pen and just cover themselves in it? That is the biggest problem i have. one of my females just loves mud. She covers herself in it. And if I don't clean her off before it dries she can't even open her eyes. I'm worried that one of these days she is gonna get it all over her nose and sufocate. How do you stop them from doing that?

Normally I wouldn't worry about it. Boxies love to wallow in water and mud and when they get too heavily caked they use their front legs and scrape it off their face. However, you said it gets so heavy she can't open her eyes, so it sounds like your soil contains too much clay so.....
Dig up the muddy area and mix in some organic matter (compost, peat moss, etc) and sand, to break up the clay and let it drain better. Cover at least part of the mud wallow with dried leaves and straw a few inches deep so she can get herself down into the mud and cover herself with leaves/straw and be hidden without being literally over her head in nothing but mud. Give her a dish for clean water big and deep enough to climb into and submerge; paint roller pans are great for this because they have a deep end and a ramp for easy in-and-out. That ought to help her clean up her act!

my area is all red clay, and when it rains here, even a slight depression in the ground becomes a mud hole. In my pens, the turtles dig scrapes and such all the time which become mudholes. Some of them LOVE to sit down in it and submerge for hours. They have always come up on their own when they needed to, scratched off the dirt, and headed to the water dish if they wanted a soak in clean water.

I'd say if wallowing in mud is your biggest problem, you've got no problems at all! It's completely normal!