Turtle Wakodahatchee FL (1 Viewer)

Is this the Florida Cooter Turtle? it is the main species I have seen mentioned for Wakodahatchee Wetlands in Florida

Niels

Looks more like what we in the UK would call a Terrapin rather than a Turtle?

Think I'm correct in saying that we reserve the name Turtle for the marine species.



A

andyadcock said:

Looks more like what we in the UK would call a Terrapin rather than a Turtle?

Think I'm correct in saying that we reserve the name Turtle for the marine species.



A

Click to expand...

One of the times you can tell that English is not my native language.

I would still like some input at species level

Niels

The three main choices for a turtle of this general description in that location are Florida Chicken Turtle (Deirochelys reticularia chrysea), Florida Redbelly Turtle (Pseudemys nelson), and Peninsula Cooter (Pseudemys floridana peninsularis).

On the Chicken Turtle, the head is much more heavily marked with yellow stripes. On the Peninsula Cooter, there are two looping yellow stripes on top of the head called "hairpins" that are not present in the pic. That leaves Florida Redbelly, which this turtle seems a reasonable match for, especially with the red marking on the shell.

BTW Niels, I know that Hurricane Maria devastated Dominica. Glad you are OK and hope that, even though the recovery will undoubtedly take a very long time, there is at least the prospect that eventually things will return to something like normal.

Thank you Randy. I sent you something about Dominica in a private communication

Niels

andyadcock said:

Looks more like what we in the UK would call a Terrapin rather than a Turtle?

Think I'm correct in saying that we reserve the name Turtle for the marine species.

Click to expand...

All the ones that swim are called turtle in American English, so Niels was right.