As we walked the sprinkler layout for the yard last week, we found a new family member. Because his front left foot is missing, we named him Stump.
Stump is an Eastern Box Turtle, which is indigenous to where we live in Northern Virginia, but so he wouldn’t get run over by a lawnmower and lose another foot, we decided Sunshine could take care of him. After some intense loving…
… we made him a habitat on the edge of our woods where we could enjoy him, but not too much.
We know the habitat isn’t permanent though we’re kind of taking advantage of Stump’s missing foot, but in the last several days, he has seemed very content there, doing what happy turtles do–wedging between tree roots in the leaves and poking his head out into the sun. Can you find him?
This morning we found a second turtle in nearly the same spot we found Stump, a girl that Princess named Maple.
Maple drank some water from the dish, wandered around the habitat, and decided she wasn’t hanging around. With all of her claws intact, she climbed right out and hid somewhere else. While Princess is disappointed, I imagine that with two turtles in a week, we’ll find others this summer, maybe even Maple. Turtles usually stick around the same location they were born in, though what’s cool is if they’re transported out, they’ll home in and travel great distances to get back there.
Maybe some of our turtles will stick around, or maybe not, but we sure are enjoying them!
