Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Referencing an earlier post, last week on the 16th, my female turtle Taylor has laid her third egg. This time it was right in middle of a garden path and this egg was damaged too like may be sat on it or walked away dragging it. All previous eggs where found the same way just laying there.
I still wonder if her earlier injuries have something to do with her ability to lay eggs back on June 16th is the reason and is she just empting out? I weighted her after the last post and really couldn’t tell.
I'll post a photo of the egg and the location later.
Any idea?

Thanks,
Alan

It's really difficult to say. It seems like the turtle isn't so much having difficulty with the egg laying part of the equation, but that there is some kind of difficulty with the nest digging part of the process.

A good nesting site will be free of obstructions to digging, such as roots or larger rocks. Digging typically takes place when the soil is somewhat moist, after a rain perhaps, which allows for easier digging.

It may be that the turtle does not have access to a suitable (by her standards) nesting site, or, she may not have full range of motion with her rear legs and is physically unable to dig a proper nest.

I have a female here that laid eggs for the very first time this summer. She is an amputee, with a missing (from the knee down) hind leg, so I monitored her constantly.

Unfortunately, when she dug her nest, she encountered roots and gave up the effort. This happened several times over the course of a couple of weeks. She was finally able to dig a (mostly) complete nest, but it took her all night and she walked away from it in the morning without laying eggs. After many attempts at digging, she finally just laid eggs on the soil surface, but sheltered by a log.

When she did this I was relieved to know that she had at least gotten the eggs out. Hopefully next year she'll have more success with her nesting endeavors.

Thank you for the timely response, I understand what you’re saying but for me I have never seen a turtle lay eggs so in my mind I see 3 eggs that are quit large for turtle and think they must dig a big hole. The ground she lives in is very soft and moist as it’s our garden which is watered regularly I have seen no signs of her digging anywhere, it is almost like she is just walking along drops an egg that is larger than her ground clearance and drags it along,. I hope that makes since.

How late in the year can box turtles lay eggs? and do you think it would be ok to mate her with 1 of my males later this year?
Thanks

alan

If you contact me off-list, I'll send you a diagram and a photo of a nest so that you can see what one would look like.