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Has anyone seen this photo? I got it from a japanese site on snappers. At least I think it was on snappers. There isn't an alligator snapper thats really that big is there?

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not sure how doctored that photo may be, but.. from the looks of the head, that is an extremely old ally snap, and if there were one that size, i believe it would look like that.

the largest alligator snapper i ever saw looked almost that size, and its an attraction at the sivler springs park in florida. for scale, it was in a concrete display pond and had a 12 inch peninsula cooter basking on its head and a 3 foot gator on its back before they were moved to start the educational show.

The snapper at silver springs is no where near that big...the one there is only like 90 pounds or so. Nothing like that at all....
TOM

then it is no longer there. the adult male i saw was the largest ally snap ive seen. this was back in 2001, so things may have changed.

I believe I saw that turtle at the chatanooga aquarium in TN. It looks like the same turtle, aquarium, and rocks in the tank. It was huge in person.
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Justin

Posted by: justin stricklin at Mon Jan 9 11:35:51 2006 [ Report Abuse ] [ Email Message ]

I believe I saw that turtle at the chatanooga aquarium in TN. It looks like the same turtle, aquarium, and rocks in the tank. It was huge in person.
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Justin

I saw that same turtle impossible to say by the pic if this is real or not but that one in TN was/is HUGE.
Its truly magnificent like a dinasour from the past. Maybe this is it and they sold it hard to tell. This tank looks different to me but maybe same turtle in another aquarium.

i live in nc and i remember seeing a gigantic alligator snapper somewhere, i wouldnt be surprised if it was the same you've mentioned.

as for doctoring, i think the shadow being cast by one of the support beams for the glass gives it away, seeing as the turtle right next to it casts no shadow outside the tank.
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-Mike Martin
North Carolina

its doctored there is no way a snapper can get that big,look at the head size compared to her body that thing could eat her.the biggest ally snapper was 215lbs. that is way over 215.its fake no questions about it

I think its fake, there are a couple things off in the pic. her hand, the edges of the panel she is infront of, just a couple things that look a little off and are consistent with other doctor pictures. that being said it is an awesome picture and that ally is pretty sweet looking. Does anyone have a pic of the biggest recorded ally? just so we can see some comparison.
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It's a fake. I saw the largest Alligator snapper in captivity at the time a number of years ago at the Toronto Zoo in Canada. I forget the exact weight but it was 200 lbs plus. It was nowhere near as large as that.

I know that serpent safari has a 211 lb alligator snapper. When they found it - had a bullet in its shelf which turned out to be a civil war musket 1870's - pretty unbelievable, that's almost 150 years old! That turtle was BIG, but that picture is ridiculous. All this talk makes me wish I hadn't sold my little guy a couple of years ago(tears).

Posted by: bluemike at Mon Jan 16 18:57:40 2006 [ Report Abuse ] [ Email Message ]

I know that serpent safari has a 211 lb alligator snapper. When they found it - had a bullet in its shelf which turned out to be a civil war musket 1870's - pretty unbelievable, that's almost 150 years old! That turtle was BIG, but that picture is ridiculous. All this talk makes me wish I hadn't sold my little guy a couple of years ago(tears).

I saw that snapper on some animal show. It was fascinating the civil war bullet in its carpace.
Some say its 150 yrs old but others say the civil war bullet could have been shot way after that period with an antique civil war type rifle. As they dont feel the bullet would have lasted that long as it would have fallen apart after 50 yrs max esp in water.
Either way its a big snapper.

That is not the only musket ball found in an alligator snapper. They have also been found with stone spear or arrowhead point in them. In fact, I think it used to be relatively common for hunters of alligator snappers to find such objects when processing them for food. Also in regards to the musket ball detiorating in water, one of the best ways to find civil war artifacts is through diving.

>>Has anyone seen this photo? I got it from a japanese site on snappers. At least I think it was on snappers. There isn't an alligator snapper thats really that big is there?
>>

If you blow it up in photo shop one can clearly see that the TURTLE has been photoshopped into an existing image. The glass frame has been doctored next to the turtle.
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That's gotta be fake. Either that or she is a dwarf! Nice thong!

I think it looks more like a big headed turtle (Platysternon megacephalum) than an ally to me. Most likely its doctored, since big heads usually grow to just about 8" (20 cm), anyway, cool turt ^^
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And still growing...

I worked for a German gentleman in Englewood Florida in 1993, he was a turtle collector and breeder. He kept an alligator snapper at least that big in a cement pond. The picture can be doctored but they really do get that big plus remember it is a small woman in that picture not a person who is 6 ft. Also Mark O Shea showed a snapper just a little smaller than that one.

I have seen turtles that big at reptile gardens these animals live along time and in captive animals that always get fed probly can get that big. The one they have at reptile gardens is just a tiny bit smaller then that one and we all know of certain memebers on bigger speices for some reason getting huger then we have ever imgined so i think its real.

that's gotta be fake. it's the size of a small bear.

I will eat my shorts in public if thats real.

With not much more to go off than old pictures of the giant snappers that used to be caught, I'm guessing it's possible for captive specimens to get at least that large. That being said, after looking at this picture (before even looking closely,) I thought it was fake. There are too many inconsistancies to blame it a flash against glass effect.

If the original poster of this thread could provide a link to the website that this pic came from then maybe this mystery could be more easily resolved. The TN aquarium claims to have the biggest in the world at 249 and that was eight years ago.
http://www.tnaqua.org/Newsroom/snapturtlerelease.asp

Here is the original link. Infering only from the pics on the first page it appears to be a site about snapping turtles.

There is also a link to the Tennessee Aquarium on that site too.
Japanese Snapper Site

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I wasn't able to come up with anything useful but thanks for trying.

That pic is obviously doctored, but that chick has one nice arse!

Unless that girl is one of the twins from Mothra, it's so obviously a fake picture that I'm surprised anyone in their right mind even thinks it has a possibility of being real. And....the picture is also doctored. Someone somewhere is getting a huge laugh out of this.
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Chick from Mothra!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!LOL GOOD ONE!!!!!!!!

Forget about the snapper!
Check out the giant turtle!

LOL
I think its a fake. The picture has too many flaws.
Shes obviously had work done!

Jason Mc

Look at her left hand. You can tell it's fake just by her hand.

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Mike
KingPin Reptiles Inc.
www.freewebs.com/mikesnake
www.freewebs.com/badyear2005

that pic is most likly an illusion,but ive got to admit i like the way that chic is bent over like that. if a snappaer got that big it would have been fed like turtle steriods and all that stuff.

I don't think it's an intentional fake-the depth of the water looks to be right near the top of the frame(look at the rosk's reflection in the back). If the girl stood up the water would probably be about 4 feet deep-a bit more than the water this 150 pounder(by the scale)is in. It's an UNintentional fake caused by an exceptional turtle, a small person and natural magnification of the water.

I still think its a big headed turtle (Platysternon megacephalum) than a snapper >.< Just check out some pics from google, the skull size, shape & head paterns match. Again, i'll have to root for the foto being doctored
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1.0.0 Leopard gecko (Eublepharis macularius)
And still growing...

The head, pointed upwards is throwing you off. Added to having a "small" size reference, being the short woman. And further more the natural magnification that such enormous thick glass produces, I estimate that the turtles highest point on its shell isn't more than 40 inches.
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Show solid evidence. Not pointing out details in the photo.
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CANADIAN CHAMELEONS

Couple of things.

Lots of aquariums put magnifying walls on their tanks so that the fish appear larger than they are and are easier to see.

Anyone ever been scuba diving? Everything underwater looks about 25% bigger than it actually is due to the refractive difference between water and air. You'll find some awesome shell that looks huge and then pick it up and realize that your hand looks pretty big too. The same effect should apply as the girl might as well be sitting in a giant dive mask.

If that turtle were real I'd love to see it in person and hate to meet it in the water.

it's a fake,a turtle like that could break that glass,my ally was in a 75g and struck at me while i was walking back and shattered the glass,now shes in a 150g which she still try's to snap at me

Hi, Dont want any conflict but the glass would be good. I dont know if its real or not (the turtle) but having worked with 800lb tigers charging glass with no cracks, breaks, etc I can safely say tempered inch or thicker glass can handle a snapper strike. It wouldnt hold the water volume at that pressure otherwise.

The glass would have to be very strong to hold the pressure of that water. Not that I think any of it is real anyway. I hope none of you think that panda is really that big, or that it was really wearing a badge.
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as much as i would love to believe that's real (and i will admit that such a turtle may or could exist, although obviously not in captivity or we'd all know about it), i have seen too many of these kind of hoaxes to but into this one. it's not even a perspective thing or a magnifying thing or any of that, it's just good old fashioned photoshop...we should all still hold out hope that a turtle that big is in the bottom of some freakshow deep pond in arkansas or something and we may someday find it, but until that day, all inquiries about this or any similar photo should start here: www.cryptozoology.com

Cryptozoology for a known species? What a joke.

no. it can refer to unverified, abnormal specimens, too. i'll bet they even have this on one of their forums, or maybe the hoax museum's website. i'm pretty certain that i saw something like this before

I have nothing against cryptozoology per say, it just seems like they are padding their part in things. Once an animal is confirmed to be a real species or confirmed to be still alive, then it moves from the realm of cryptozoology and into the realm of zoology.

Fake, fake, fake, fake, fake... But a decent fake... The woman is super "deformed." The arms look like they should be on a toddler, not an adult female... The head's grain is different from the body and the rest of the background; and the hands/wrist area are simply a give away. Somebody probably snapped a shot of their kid next to that snapper, blew it up, and then cut-and-pasted in an adult's body to make it look bigger then it is. Super cool snapper though.

It is an awesome photo, that is undeniable. I don't believe it is true, and probably couldn't even be true, but it would be great if it was real or possible to find one that big. Let us hope I suppose.

Aside from that, I believe we would have heard of this, I know I watch and read a lot about turtles, and have never. 250lbs. is the biggest I've heard of, give or take a few. There are rumors of ones from long ago, like 439lbs. in Kansas, but nothing confirmed. Man that would be great though.