{"id":5659,"date":"2010-03-29T18:59:07","date_gmt":"2010-03-29T23:59:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/?p=5659"},"modified":"2010-03-29T19:01:32","modified_gmt":"2010-03-30T00:01:32","slug":"spotted-turtles-lovin-in-the-rain","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/?p=5659","title":{"rendered":"Spotted Turtles Lovin’ in the Rain"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"stbm<\/a><\/p>\n

Mating Pair of Spotted Turtles (Male Left)<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Pouring rain all day has left the South Coast of Massachusetts drowning in mud and puddles.\u00c2\u00a0 Turtle Journal explored wetlands in search of amphibians and reptiles that exploit these conditions for spring mating.\u00c2\u00a0 We found large eggs sacs from spotted salamaders in a nearby abandoned cranberry bog, and we heard a few spring peepers screaming for attention.\u00c2\u00a0 But the only\u00c2\u00a0loving we confirmed this morning was a mating pair of spotted turtles at Brainard Marsh off Buzzards Bay.<\/p>\n

<\/embed><\/object><\/p>\n

Spotted Turtles Lovin’ in the Rain<\/em><\/strong>\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

This lovely pair included a female turtle, #13, that we have been tracking for several years\u00c2\u00a0with a new male partner who refused to show his face.\u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"female<\/a><\/p>\n

Female Spotted Turtle<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Spotted turtle #13 above sports a large bulbous growth under her carapace in her fourth vertebral.\u00c2\u00a0 Like all spotted females, she has a\u00c2\u00a0colorful neck, washboard abs and a thin tail.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"male<\/a><\/p>\n

Male Spotted Turtle<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

In contrast, our male spotted turtle has a concavity in the middle of its abdominal plastron scutes, a thicker tail and drab coloring under his chin.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mating Pair of Spotted Turtles (Male Left) Pouring rain all day has left the South Coast of Massachusetts drowning in mud and puddles.\u00c2\u00a0 Turtle Journal explored wetlands in search of amphibians and reptiles that exploit these conditions for spring mating.\u00c2\u00a0 We found large eggs sacs from spotted salamaders in a nearby abandoned cranberry bog, and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[23],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5659"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5659"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5659\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5679,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5659\/revisions\/5679"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5659"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5659"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5659"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}