#box turtles

Florida Wildlife; vol. 12, no. 4. September, 1958. Illustration by Wallace Hughes.

Eastern Box Turtle (Terrapene carolina ssp. carolina)

The box turtle was 100% face down in the dirt asleep. The little rattlesnake didn't even notice them and slithered right over their head and woke them up.

Do I ever!

There are a few things that make box turtles as a group pretty special. For starters, even though they're turtles, they are entirely terrestrial; they spend almost their whole lives on land and can't swim very well. Secondly, they're called box turtles due to their unique shells. In addition to being very high domed, the underbelly (or plastron) has a 'hinge' so that, when the turtle is frightened, it can pull its head and limbs in and close up its shell completely-- just like a box!

(Image: An eastern box turtle (Terrapine carolina) by Ben Wurst)

As for eastern box turtles specifically, they are the state reptile for Tennessee and North Carolina in the United States. They have an incredibly small home range, typically not more than a few square kilometers, but they have a very powerful homing sense and can orient themselves even when moved miles away from their habitat. Lastly, unlike many other turtle species, the best way to distinguish between males and females is by eye color! Males have bright red eyes, while females have duller brown eyes.

Box turtle and yellow-shafted flicker!

These pins weren't finalized due to manufacturing errors, but I'm very proud of the designs themselves and wanted to share before the year is up. 😄 Perhaps more interesting to me is the turtle's design revision (2nd image here). Something was bugging me about it all these years, so I narrowed it down and tried to make it read as a box turtle proper. The beak was such a simple change, but I think it fixed so much!