Credit: CC0 Public Domain
Two words: Whoa, Nelly.
A brave research crew from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission found three massive and scarce turtles near Gainesville late last week, according to a Facebook post.
The reptiles are a newly discovered species: the Suwannee crocodile snapping turtle, also called Macrochelys suwanniensis, the agency said.
“Once upon a time, the alligator snapping turtle (Macrochelys temminckii) was considered a single, extensive species that extended from the drainage of the Suwannee River to western Texas,” the FWC post reads. “(E) totally agree that the Suwannee species differs. The Suwannee alligator-snapping turtle has been isolated for at least 5.5 million years, during which time it has undergone sufficient evolutionary changes to distinguish it from other alligator-snapping the tortoise. “
According to the Florida Natural Areas Inventory Research Center at Florida State University, these reptiles can reach “immense proportions”, an adult male can grow up to two and a half meters tall, weighing more than 200 pounds. They can be up to about 100 years old.
Like all snapping turtles, it has a rough brown shell and long tail; an “exceptionally large”, triangular head; hooked beak; and strong jaw (hence the alligator reference).
FWC said in the post that it helps to “document the distribution and relative abundance of this state endangered species.” Their numbers have been reduced by “unregulated harvesting and habitat loss.”
Six hoop nets were set in the New River, a freshwater stream with low biological productivity, the agency said, “so finding a large turtle in such a small stream is unusual.”
In one case, they caught a large boy, a 100-pound man.
Also, um, snapped up: a 46-pound female and a 64-pound male.
The turtles, estimated to be between 40 and 80 years old, were released back into the wild after collecting data.
When you see someone, you might want to go beyond social distance.
Comments on the FWC post were pretty baffling.
“Oh my goodness!”
“Beautiful.”
“Holy shit!”
“Great animals.”
Study shows ‘dinosaurs of the turtle world’ in danger in Southeast rivers
© 2020 Miami Herald
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Quote: Researchers just caught 3 huge ‘alligator snapping turtles’ (2020, August 27) retrieved August 28, 2020 from https://phys.org/news/2020-08-captured-huge-alligator-snapping-turtles.html
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