A New Turtle In Town

The other morning in I was in our bathroom, doing what one does in such a room when I heard a commotion outside. Something or someone was banging around on the door to our crawl space.

It was a turtle.

An Eastern Painted Turtle. This was not the place it should be.

That's better. Now we have two Eastern Painted Turtles living in our back pond. Hamster, on the left, and the new one, yet to be named (make suggestions in the comments) on the right.

And while Hamster will swim right up to me, expecting to be fed, the new one is very shy. Heading to the center of the pond, amongst the water lilies, at the slightest sign of us. It took awhile to get this image.

Now, last Friday, I went out to get the lawnmower, which is in one of our outbuildings. Near the back pond. And I find the new turtle digging a hole. The turtle freezes, hoping I won't notice. I go into the building to get the mower, and when I come out the turtle is gone.

Bummer. Sorry.

So I go mow the front yard, leaving the back to the turtles. And sure enough it went back and started digging again.

I set up at a respectful distance, and watched as it went about its turtle business.

And when she was done I went up and found this:

I covered it up for the night, to protect any eggs from the local raccoons, fox, and other predators.

And the next day I built this:

The pond is in the background.

I finished it with cinder blocks to dissuade digging.

And in 72 days we hope to have baby turtles, eager to get to the safety of the pond.

So set a reminder to check back in just under two and a half months.