Space Invader*

Snapping Turtle on "the Lawn" adjacent to the Wetland, July 31, 2021

On July 31st as I was getting ready to leave the wetland I came across a decent-sized snapping turtle in the grassy space between the wetland and the parking area. I didn't pull out a tape measure but would estimate the shell itself to have been about a foot long. Certainly snapping turtles get much larger, but at the same time, the size of this one is nothing to sneeze at. My assumption is that this was a female over from the lake on a search for a good place to deposit her eggs. The INHS page on snapping turtles states that females lay eggs from mid-May to mid-June, so July 31 might be a bit of a stretch, but other sources seem to leave room for the possibility that this is a female out laying eggs.

I got to thinking later that day that if this gal (or guy?) found its way into the wetland, it would very easily become the undisputed queen of the pond. A snapping turtle of this size would have no problem eating just about anything else in the wetland, including common water snakes of any size, any of the frogs that live there and even at least the smaller turtles of other species. Plants, tadpoles, frog eggs, aquatic insects, crayfish, etc. all go without saying.

On my next visit to the wetland, August 4th, as I was "making my rounds," sure enough, there she was in the wetland itself. I have not seen her since so do not know if she has continued there or not. With all of the available food there though and the total lack of competition this gal would find, the only reasons I can think for her to move on would be when the water levels get too low or perhaps the water temperatures uncomfortably warm due to how shallow they are. Meanwhile, she's the queen.

Snapping Turtle in the Homer Lake Wetland, August 4, 2021

* "Space Invader" as in invading the space, not as in invader from space!