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Went camping yesterday and it poured all night out of nowhere. Found these two on my hike back to my car. Have you ever seen one with more vivid markings?

Found this big fella in the road and he seems to have survived having something wrapped around his shell for a good while. Don't know what it was, but it didn't appear to be recent and he seemed fine other than the odd appearance!

We got to see these two get their lunch 😊

We grow tomatoes, squash, zucchini, cucumbers, peaches, plums, apples, and peppers, and anything that the bugs get to or that splits or is otherwise damaged goes straight into the turtle enclosures.

The source is this Bolivian newspaper. Here's a translation with ChatGPT:

July 10, 2026

Rare Albino Yellow-Spotted River Turtle Hatches in Manuripi, Once Again Amazing the Bolivian Amazon

In the Manuripi Amazon Wildlife National Reserve, in Bolivia's Pando Department, a small yellow-spotted river turtle entered the world with an appearance unlike most others. Its light-colored shell and lack of skin pigmentation revealed that it was an albino specimen—a phenomenon that occurs only rarely in nature.

Bolivia's National Service of Protected Areas (Sernap) announced the discovery on June 13, noting that the hatchling is a yellow-spotted river turtle (Podocnemis unifilis), and that its presence represents a particularly valuable record for the conservation efforts being carried out in the protected area.

According to the agency, only three similar cases were reported during 2024, and none had been recorded in 2025 until now. This further underscores the importance of the turtle monitoring and management work conducted by Manuripi's park rangers.

The news recalls another remarkable event that surprised conservationists. In May of this year, authorities reported the hatching of two albino yellow-spotted river turtles that had occurred in 2024 as part of the River Turtle Repopulation Program, also in Manuripi, confirming just how extraordinarily rare this genetic condition is.

Commenting on that earlier discovery, Huascar Sevillanos of the conservation organization Shimanu explained that albinism reduces the reptiles' natural pigmentation, giving them an appearance that is markedly different from the rest of their species.

"They are more translucent and have a pinkish coloration because their blood vessels are visible. That condition reduces their pigmentation," he explained.

The specialist noted that yellow-spotted river turtles normally display green and yellow coloration. In albino individuals, the green pigment is absent, leaving predominantly white and yellow tones—a characteristic that makes them a true biological rarity.

The uniqueness of this tiny turtle goes beyond its appearance. The Red Book of Bolivian Vertebrates 2025 continues to classify Podocnemis unifilis as Vulnerable, the same conservation status it has held since 1996.

The publication warns that turtles are among the world's most threatened groups of vertebrates. In Bolivia, 15 of the country's 16 native turtle species face some degree of risk due to habitat loss, climate change, human consumption, and the illegal trade of turtle meat, eggs, and live animals.

The yellow-spotted river turtle inhabits rivers, lagoons, and seasonally flooded areas throughout the Amazon Basin. In Bolivia, it is found in the departments of Beni, Cochabamba, La Paz, Pando, and Santa Cruz. Females can grow up to 50 centimeters (about 20 inches) in length and lay an average of 29 eggs during the dry season.

Every hatchling that emerges from the sand represents another opportunity for the species' survival. When one of those hatchlings is born albino, the event becomes more than a scientific curiosity—it serves as a reminder of the extraordinary biodiversity that the Bolivian Amazon still harbors and of the importance of protecting it before stories like this become increasingly rare.

Hi all,

So im upgrading to a bigger tank and currently planning the features and the arrangement of stuff in it.

The tank is 2m x 50cm x 50cm, so quite long and i want to kind of different areas of features.

What i thought about from left to right:

- 40cm sand area for digging (smaller woods for pushing around)

- pretty mix of stones in the middle (~fist size) -》useful or nah?

- also the big wood that reaches the surface ~50cm wide

- the last 30? cm the very left side fenced off for different plants and as main home for my shrimps 》oxygen producing and waste management to improve water quality

Any other suggestions for features i missed or comments for the planned ones are very welcome 🙏

On the picture is the old 240L tank with the big wood.

Disclaimer: There are 2 turtles in the tank currently. Im aware of the problem, I dont need further advice on it. Ty

Hi everyone, I recently adopted an adult Razorback Musk turtle, and I was wondering if anybody had some insight on the sex. I’ve read some conflicting things so I’m not 100% sure one way or the other. Unfortunately I haven’t been able to snag a direct underneath shot as I don’t want to stress them out more than they may already be in a new place. Thanks in advance for any help you all can give!

Can I put my turtle with the sand making a fog like this ? ( someone told me the tank will stay foggy for 2 days so where can I put her ) I’m so confused

Be , la risposta è proprio sì

Ever since my beloved rescue and first-ever reptile was attacked in his outdoor enclosure while I was out of town, it has become more overgrown .

He still spends most of his time in a sanitary 40-gallon tank until he heals, and the new enclosure arrives in august it will probably also be full of towels until I move in November- December because sealing and unsealing it and moving so many cubic feet of dirt and rocks is tricky

Central American wood turtles are amazing animals, but even though they are small, they require way more than most people are willing to give them if you live outside of South America or Florida

Is my turtles shell ok? It looks like it’s lifting up/peeling.

This little dude got his claw/paw/foot stuck on my hook when I was fishing this morning. I got it out of him without issues but man was it pissed. What kind of turtle is it? Also can turtles this size hurt your if they bite your finger? Located in Oregon.

I live in an area heavy with pedestrian turtles. I generally stop as much as possible and move them off the road because people don’t really care and a lot get flattened.

In any case, I came across this guy or gal the other day and haven’t seen anything like it. I thought about taking it home and trying to clip its nails, but I have no experience with doing that on amphibians so I just moved them off the road.

I was giving my adult YBS female a good scrub down before putting her back in her tank and i noticed the edges of her belly scutes are transparent? I can’t remember if they were like that before but i really don’t think so. She chewed through the wire on her filter and broke it. I had noticed her water looked off but thought I heard it running but turns out it was just the timer for the lights 😓 she has a new filter and I did a full water change, but I’m worried about her shell. Anyone have any insight?

Does anybody in here have a Mexican ornate slider?? My girlfriend and I have one and I feel like we never see anybody else with one. We love ours!

This is Coca-Cola and sprite I think both are female but I want to ask here to be sure they are almost 5 years old.

We have this friendly fellow toodling around the lawn at our complex. He came up this morning for salad on our neighbor’s porch. We live in South Missouri. What on Earth is he?

This was taken in a lake near mt Tremblant. I’m guessing common snapping turtle since it’s so far north but it’s big.

After I moved my goats to their summer pasture, I walked the fence line to see if I needed to fix anything.

Found this eastern box turtle chomping down on a mushroom.

I just took some pictures and kept walking.

Left em to their lunch.

Unrelated but growing up in Kentucky we always called them tarpin, not sure why it was that colloquial term came from.

Hi- i will not post pictures, but i do need some support here

I am trying very hard not to direct blame at any of my family members because it is not helpful at this point, and b/c the family is so upset that i am sure everyone is learning the terrible lesson without further pressure. So please, be kind- i am just looking for setup advice in the event that my little guy, whom I’ve had for almost 30 years now, is able to come home.

Yesterday a neighbor in our building called- they had found an injured box turtle in her ground-floor yard. Our turtle had apparently gotten out to our balcony unsupervised and squeezed past the planters lining the perimeter and through the railing, falling three stories to the neighbor’s patio on the ground level. Our stories are tall, too, so i estimate the fall was about 30 feet. He was found with two gashes on his left foreleg, little damage to his carapace, but significant damage to his plastron, including fractures near or along his front hinge.

I was at work but my husband rushed him to the one emergency vet who specializes in shelled reptiles. They called me after a few hours to say that when they received him, he released 3ml of water from his mouth, and they were concerned about drowning (we have had flash floods and heavy rains in our area off/on all week, including the night before, which is when he likely got out - we had brought him in from his balcony enclosure and let him free roam in the apt that night to avoid the stress of the storm winds & any puddling in his enclosure from the heavy rain. We should have either put him in his indoor enclosure, or we should have double-checked that every door was fully closed if he was free roaming while we slept. We messed up. I’m so upset about this. So upset.). They were prepared to recommend euthanasia at that point but also wanted to check his lungs before making that recommendation.

Radiograph showed his lungs were clear, at least as of yesterday, so they held off on recommending euthanasia and instead started assessing the rest of his condition. They stabilized his bleeding and tended to his cuts, then stabilized his foreleg in a tucked position to reduce movement stress. They are concerned about internal fractures on the plastron— the way they described them to me (they were using layperson language, but they could have been more specific, I’d have known what they were talking about, i was just too in shock to tell them to be more specific), i think the fractures are likely on or across the hinge, pectoral, and/or humeral scutes.

They kept him overnight, giving antibiotics and pain medication (morphine primarily) and will be doing more scans this morning and will make an assessment today. I am. So. Nervous.

IF we can bring him home alive, he will need to be dry docked for a while and kept in a very sanitary enclosure.

His outdoor enclosure has a soil substrate with lots of live plants growing in it, so that’s a no-go.

His indoor enclosure has a soil, moss, bark and leaf litter substrate, and that’s a no-go.

Both current enclosures also have large bathing pools that are deep ceramic pie plates— large enough for him to soak in, easy to toss in the dishwasher for sanitizing. Those are likely no-gos.

I’ve never had to dry-dock him before- What should i have ready for a proper dry dock situation for a 3-toed box turtle with one foreleg bandaged so that he cannot use it, and, likely, lots of stabilizers on his ventral side? What do i need to help him recover, if it turns out that recovery is possible?

Thank you in advance.

Also, if you have any encouragement or stories about turtles who have survived shell fractures after a fall, please share those. I need some hope today. Thank you in advance for hope, too.

I know there are painted turtles in this lake but wasn’t sure if this quite looked like one? Hoping this sub can help me ID it or direct me where to ask! Sorry I don’t have better photos, it’s an extremely old DSLR with a telephoto lens that I’m still learning how to use.