Friday, May 8, 2009

Our Friend for the Day

Today Cade went out to start the rest of his mowing today and noticed something in our yard close to our house...not in the woods! He looked at it and we noticed him at the same time. I knew that it was something but didn't know what so we all ran outside (Except Emma and Sarah because they were napping!) to see what it was there. It was a nice size turtle. There was a patch of mud behind him. I just figured he had found some mud and was stuck. We watched for a few minutes and he watched us. I had a photo shoot with a turtle and then we moved him so he would not be in Cade's way of mowing.



This is the underside of our turtle.

Tate moved him for us.

Hey Mr. Turtle

We watched him crawl away.

Bye!


Then, Cade went back to look at the hole in the mud. Turns out there was something in it. After further investigation, it turns out that there is at least 6 eggs in that hole. (6 EGGS) It wasn't a HE turtle but a SHE turtle. I had no idea that she was laying eggs. I hope she was finished and we did not disturb her. Poor Clara (Cade named her.) interrupted during labor and delivery. I wish you could have seen the eggs in the hole but this and the next one are the best pictures I could get of the hole.

I looked up info on the computer as to when the eggs might hatch and it said at least 3 months depending on the species of the turtle. I have no idea what kind of turtle this was but I would like to protect her nest from the critters so the boys will be able to watch this process and save the eggs. We have armadillos and other critters who dig holes in our yard at night. I found a site that had some great info along with pictures to make a barrier around it with chicken wire or screen of some sort. I emailed it to Rob and I hope he allows us to do this. Don't you think this would be a great project for the boys!!!
If he let us make a barrier to protect the eggs, I will take pictures for another post. Then, we can blog about the progress and hopefully our baby turtles!

This is a video of our turtle friend leaving us for the day. The boys liked watching her because they thought she crawled faster than they thought she could. (The Tortoise and the Hare...I reminded them that it was still much slower than a rabbit!)
Anything interesting happen with you and your family today?


4 comments:

Tracy said...

Wow....cool, but poor thing. I hope she was done too!

Jenn said...

That would be pretty neat if the eggs survive. Keep us posted on that.

Anonymous said...

That is awesome!

Katie said...

That's so neat! And how funny that he named her Clara! :) Poor thing - I don't think I'd be so calm if I was interrupted during labor!