Chicken Turtles: Striped Forelegs and Rump, Neck Long as Upper-Shell

Summary: North American chicken turtle habitats get necks long as shells, striped forelegs and webfeet on big, thin-tailed females and small, thick-tailed males.

Florida chicken turtle (Deirochelys reticularia chrysea) basks on log in Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge (NWR), Brevard County, east central Florida; Dec. 19, 2011; NASA ID KSC-2011-8338: Jim Grossmann/NASA, Generally not subject to copyright in the United States; may use this material for educational or informational purposes, including photo collections, textbooks, public exhibits, computer graphical simulations and Internet Web pages; general permission extends to personal Web pages, via NASA Image and Video Library/Kennedy Space Center (KSC)

North American chicken habitats accumulate in Mid-Atlantic and Gulf coastal plain distribution ranges from southeastern Virginia southward through Florida, westward through eastern Texas, northward inland through Oklahoma and Missouri and everywhere in-between.

Chicken turtles bear their species common name for bountiful flesh beloved to Southern States' cuisines and the subspecies common names eastern, Florida and western chicken turtles. The species scientific name Deirochelys reticularia ("net-patterned neck-turtle") considers the subspecies scientific names Deirochelys reticularia reticularia, Deirochelys reticularia chrysea ("gold-vesseled") and Deirochelys reticularia miaria ("defiled"). Descriptions in 1801 by Pierre André Latreille (Nov. 29, 1762-Feb. 6, 1833) and in 1956 by Albert Schwartz (Sep. 13, 1923-Oct. 18, 1992) drive scientific designations.

Western, Florida and eastern chicken turtle life cycles expect shallow ditches, lakes, ponds and swamps with abundant aquatic and terrestrial vegetation, basking sites and cypress stands.

February through May, August through November and September through March fit into emydid turtle life cycles as respective eastern, western and Florida chicken turtle breeding months.

People, who rarely get bitten except during the cruelest captures, group all three subspecies with the shyest of Emydidae bog, marsh and pond turtle family members. They have the emydid turtle habit of harboring toxins in their flesh from happening upon and harvesting invertebrate food sources harmed by pesticide exposure and ingestion. Their daytime itineraries include sun-warmed interludes on grasses, ground-covers, rocks, soils and stumps and, despite their elongated, flattened, land-unfriendly, untortoise-like, water-unfriendly webbed hindfeet, diurnal walking intervals.

Agroindustrialists, breeders, collectors, drillers, polluters and predatory alligators, fire ants, foxes, moles, opossums, otters, raccoons, skunks, snakes and snapping turtles jeopardize North American chicken turtle habitats.

Western, Florida and eastern chicken turtles keep their elongated, straightened foreclaws keen for elaborate courtship behaviors like those known by other, related emydid turtle family members.

Females lay 2 to 3 seasonal clutches of 5 to 15 elliptical, flexible-, 1.375-inch- (3.49-millimeter-) long, pale, thin-shelled eggs in flask-shaped, 4-inch- (10.16-centimeter-) deep nest cavities. Females and males respectively manifest physical and sexual maturity with 7-inch (17.78-centimeter) lengths as six- to eight-year-olds and with 4-inch (10.16-centimeter) lengths as two- to four-year-olds. Amphibian and insect larvae, aquatic invertebrates, carrion, crayfish, fish, fruits, tadpoles, water hyacinth, water lettuce and watercress nourish omnivorous (everything-eating) western, Florida and eastern chicken turtles.

North American chicken habitats offer season's coldest temperature ranges, northward to southward, from minus 5 to 30 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 20.56 to minus 1.11 degrees Celsius).

Bald cypress, black-gum, button-bush, loblolly bay, magnolia, maple, pond cypress, pond pine, red bay, sumac, sweet bay, sweet-gum and water lily promote North American chicken turtles.

Four to 10 inches (10.16 to 25.4 centimeters) queue up total lengths on semi-wrinkled carapaces with light-striped rumps, striped necks long as upper-shells and wide-striped forelegs. Eastern chicken turtle upper-shells reveal brown-green, narrow, netlike patterns and narrow, yellow rims even though southeastward in Florida gold-orange-lined carapace patterns and orange-yellow lower-shells (plastrons) rule. Western chicken turtle lower- and upper-shells respectively show dark seams and broad, faint, netlike patterns whereas all subspecies sustain small-sized, thick-tailed males and large-sized, thin-tailed females.

North American chicken turtle habitats tender big-sized, flat-plastroned, thin-tailed females and concave-shelled, small-sized, thick-tailed males with small-headed, super-long necks, striped forelegs and rumps and webbed hindfeet.

eastern chicken turtle (Deirochelys reticularia reticularia); First Landing State Park, Cape Henry, northwestern Virginia Beach, southeastern Virginia; Tuesday, July 3, 2012: Virginia State Parks (vastateparksstaff), CC BY 2.0 Generic, via Flickr

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Image credits:

Florida chicken turtle (Deirochelys reticularia chrysea) basks on log in Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge (NWR), Brevard County, east central Florida; Dec. 19, 2011; NASA ID KSC-2011-8338: Jim Grossmann/NASA, Generally not subject to copyright in the United States; may use this material for educational or informational purposes, including photo collections, textbooks, public exhibits, computer graphical simulations and Internet Web pages; general permission extends to personal Web pages, via NASA Image and Video Library/Kennedy Space Center (KSC) @ https://images.nasa.gov/details/KSC-2011-8338

eastern chicken turtle (Deirochelys reticularia reticularia); First Landing State Park, Cape Henry, northwestern Virginia Beach, southeastern Virginia; Tuesday, July 3, 2012: Virginia State Parks (vastateparksstaff), CC BY 2.0 Generic, via Flickr @ https://www.flickr.com/photos/vastateparksstaff/7845957020/

For further information:

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Available @ https://twitter.com/NASAKennedy/status/151696874796089344

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Available via Biodiversity Heritage Library @ https://biodiversitylibrary.org/page/2774126

Schwartz, Albert. 1956. "Geographic Variation in the Chicken Turtle Deirochelys reticularia Latreille: Deirochelys reticularia miaria subsp. nov." Fieldiana -- Zoology, vol. 34, no. 41 (Nov. 13, 1956): 486-497.
Available via Biodiversity Heritage Library @ https://biodiversitylibrary.org/page/2774136

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