My First Box Turtle About three years ago I had a female Eastern Box Turtle. She was maybe as big as a small paperback with an orange stomach and a hazelnut color with brown plates colliding into each other making a hard and sturdy shell. Her extremities were scaled but rough; each scale had an orange underside that matched her smooth underbelly. Her face was wrinkled and her eyes were red rimmed. The most obvious detail was the large white patch in the center of her shell from a distance looked like the top of her shell had been bleached. One day I was at my lake house taking a walk after a long day of skiing and swimming with my dad my sister and my mom. I had just left the railroad track about a mile or two from my house; I usually go to the trestle and look for bones on the track. As I was walking up the last or second of last hill I saw a turtle almost invisible amongst the dark brown leaves I trudged through the river of leaves and picked it up, and to my surprise there was a huge gash, cut sharply into the shape of a lighting bolt in the top of the shell. I took it back on the road and I felt it move one of its legs. I hurried back to my house to show my dad. I stumbled down the steep incline that led to my house ,and yanked open the front door excited to show my family and friends. As soon as I showed my dad …show more content…
She ate fairly well for a turtle that had bean taken from the wild only weeks ago. Her shell was holding together very well and I was happy that it was because if it had not the turtle would have got maggots and died. I had noticed that the air stung the skin and I knew I would have to hibernate her soon. And the next week that's just what I did. I Dug a deep wide hole in my back yard and plzced my small turtle inside the hole then dumped three trash bags full of brown and orange` leaves into the