Rose Cottage Ltd

If you happened to read my post a few days ago, you’ll know that large snapping turtles are in the lake on my property. If they hadn’t proven to be deadly to the little goslings that also live here, I’d probably not have paid them much attention at all. Instead, I’ve managed to trap and relocate 3 of them so far, but as you’ll see from the images below, there is work remaining to be done.

I noticed some strange splashing going on at the far end of the lake on Tuesday and went, camera in hand, to investigate. The sight of these two male turtles fighting was something to see. The goal or the “win” seems to be to get your opponent upside down underwater and hold him there until he drowns.

Look at the size of those claws!

I should have taken my Flip video with me to record the rather horrible sounds of this fight – which did seem prehistoric. Hissing and snapping of their jaws, and if turtles can scream – these did. This was not “play.” Each of these turtles weighs somewhere near 30 pounds.

This shot reminds me of the last scene of one of the “Friday the 13th” movies where good old “Jason” comes up from under the water on that lake and grabs the heroine of the movie out of the boat! The one turtle getting ready to pounce on the other in this image was definitely the aggressor of this battle.

I was in the boat by this last shot and having watched this battle for nearly 15 minutes decided to break it up. I hit the water around them with the paddle until one finally broke free of the other and headed for deeper water. I’m guessing there is a large female turtle also on this lake – that is probably the cause of this skirmish.

Looks like more chicken legs in the turtle trap for the next several weeks…

+ More on snapping turtles

+ Some interesting turtle research in South Florida

+ Good info about trapping and relocating turtles and, how to build your own turtle trap