Turtles and Tortoises

What sort of animal would you make out of an egg carton?

Make an oviparious animal of course!

An oviparious animal is an animal that produces its young by laying eggs. The list includes birds, lizards, insects, spiders, alligators, crabs, some fish and guess what else -- turtles!

We have many different kinds of turtles here at Brookgreen Gardens. Some of them are part of our animal collection.

 We have a diamond back terrapin named Mishell, and a Red-eared slider named Needleman who is also a terrapin. Terrapin turtles spend most of their time in water, so they have webbed feet for swimming. Terrapins like to eat meat such as fish and worms but will also eat plants.

turtles in CDR.jpg

Needleman and Mishell

The other two turtles we have in our collection are called Eastern Box turtles. This type of turtle is called a tortoise. They live on land instead of in the water, so they do not have webbed feet. They also like to eat meat such as earth worms and some plants. A tortoise has a domed shell, which it closes like a box in order to hide from predators. The male box turtle is named ET, and the female is named OT. ET has red eyes which is usually the eye color of a mature male. And OT has brown eyes which is usually the eye color of female box turtles.

box turtle.jpg

This is OT the female, do you see her brown eye?

We also have a Gopher tortoise that lives at Brookgreen - he's not actually part of our zoo collection, but he lives in the deer savannah area. You probably won't ever see him because Gopher tortoises spend most of their lives underground! 

A turtle we don’t have at Brookgreen is a sea turtle! They live in the ocean and have flippers for swimming.

One thing all turtles have in common is they lay eggs on land. So, they are oviparious!

Here is how to make a turtle out of an egg carton!

          Materials:

                   Egg carton

                   Paint or colored markers

                   Craft glue

                   Construction paper and scissors.

          Procedure:

1. Take an egg carton and cut around the egg cups to separate them from each other.

2. Paint or color one egg cup with markers.

3. Draw a turtle body shape on construction paper. Use the egg cup to trace around for the body and then add legs and a head. Don’t forget a small tail!

4. Glue the egg cup to the paper body and let dry.

turtle shape.jpg

egg carton turtle.jpg

Make more oviparious animals from your egg carton!