Skyler

above: bellybutton of turtle

below: the white thing  on its nose is a egg tooth

yesterday morning i went outside to the turtle pen to see if the eggs have hatched, as i do everyday.  i saw the stick where we had marked exactly where the eggs were, move.  i moved around the dirt and saw a baby turtle shell.  i waited for it to come out of the ground because i did not want to force it out of the ground.  this morning i went outside and i saw it come out of the ground. i decided to name it Skylar because that can be a boy or a girl name.

above: Skylar compared to Lil'L.

Tank

A few weeks ago one of my friends texted me that their mom had found a baby box turtle.  they asked if i wanted it and i said yes. its a little smaller than Lil'L.  sadly we let him go because we thought he bit Lil'Ls foot.  we later found out she had not been bit but she had a clump of dirt in her leg hole.

Lil'L Escaping Grass

Lil'L running 2 shade.

Turtle theif

                                                       above: where someone painted my name

                                                      above: deer skull belowe: broken deer bone

                                                           above: ashers broken shell

                                                    above: turtle shell below: fallen rock cave

recently there has been lots of turtles "escaping".  But I know thats not true.  someone has been letting them go.  there is no possable way for them to escape.  Ive had four turtes dissapear.  someone wrote BRETT on the turtle pen.  someone broke a deer bone in there.  they also pushed down a deer skull,  turned over a turtle shell, broke and flipped ashers shell(we found ashers shell empy.  Are theorey is that he dranke oil and got poisond.) and pushed don a rock cave.  we have no clue who it is.

Lil L's feast

Today i got Lil L crickets and I dumped them all in her cage at once.  She went crazy. she ran around chasing them even if she had one in her mouth. i video taped her its hullarious.

lucy

I was walking in the woods with some friends and i saw a turtle.  It was making a nest to lay its eggs.  since it wasn't digging the hole yet i took it to my turtle pen.  I didn't see it lay eggs but it must of.

turtle

The other day Mikey came over with a male box turtle.  He never named it but all i can tell u about it is this.  He brought It over.  I went fishing.  Came back and he was gone.  in 3 hours he escaped.

turtle

the other day my friend Zack brought over a turtle.  She doesn't have a name because he found her so it is his turtle and he hasn't  named it.

Natalie

OK so after I went inside after watching Susan laying eggs i got a visit from my neighbor Greg.  He said there was a turtle digging a hole in his yard.  I walked over and sure enough there was a turtle laying eggs in his yard.  we transferred the eggs to my turtle pen.  I named it Natalie because his daughters name is Natalie.

Susan layed eggs

On may 17 i went outside to the turtle pen only to find out that SUSAN WAS LAYING EGGS!!!!  OK i shouldn't say only to find because it was a big find but any way i have them protected.

lucky laying eggs

On may 16th i was at my friend Caseys house and I looked up.  I saw a turtle.  I ran up to it with him following and noticed something.  It was laying eggs.  I decided to name it lucky because it was lucky we found it.  Sadly it was disterbed by this little kid across the street and a root so it never actually layed the eggs.

Susan

I was geting ready for my band consert on may 10th when the doorbell rang.   I opened the door and it was mikey with a turtle. He said he found it in the woods behind zacks house. It was the first turtle of the year, late, thanks to the people who cut the woods down.  we named it susan.

Oh yah! Turtle Pen

Something that My dad and I did In the winter of 2010 was build a out door turtle pen. It was very simple. all we had to do was get a bunch of wood from the home depot and stack and nail it in. Then we decorated it so the turtles would feel at home. we also put some plants in there. Now this picture is a picture of it before we clean it up this year because when we clean it up it looks alsome. last year we had up to 6 turtles at a time.This turtles pen is the same one that ridgy lay ed her eggs, Adrian lay ed he eggs, Mary Lu lay ed her eggs, and where Ashley mated. It is much better than the old turtle pen and much bigger. Also in the picture you cant see the different decorations like the deer skull, the deer bones, the rocks and the plants.

Woods Dissapering

I don't think this year will be very productive with turtles for this very reason. About two weeks ago I came home from wrestling practice and my dad told me that part of the woods had been cut down. I had no idea how to react. I was petrified. the next day I walked into the woods after about a half a mile I saw what my dad had been talking about the day before it was terrible. It was almost like a tornado had come and ripped the trees out of the ground.
About a half of a week later I had just gotten home from school. I got off the bus and one of my friends asked me what the noise coming from the woods was. I told them it was probably the people cleaning up the fallen trees. I walked inside and noticed my mom had a grim look on her face. She told me to come into the back. when I walked outside I saw trees falling from the woods and machines rolling around picking them up. It was almost like the woods was disappearing before my eyes.
My mom said, " I never thought it would get this close to the house."
It felt like half of my life had been ripped out. Almost like all my child hood memories had floated away and would never come back. I'm still having a hard time hopefully I will get over it soon.
That's the reason I don't think that there will be much turtles this season.