Series note: The region’s collection of native species is under threat on several fronts, most notably from humanity’s shortsightedness. Humans aren’t giving the natural world the space it needs and deserves. We’re crowding out nonhuman life, which, in turn, makes nature less productive and us less healthy. Wild New England examines the animals and insects most at risk.
This story was originally published by ecoRI News, a publication partner of Ocean State Stories.
When these turtles are hungry, they are known to thump the ground with their feet to simulate rain, which brings worms to the surface for dinner. These omnivores also eat flowers, fruits, leaves, insects, worms, and carrion when they aren’t fishing for invertebrates. They forage on both land and in the water, but are slow feeders and aren’t good at catching fast prey.
Wood turtles were once common in the Northeast, in habitats that featured streams, fields, and forests. But a combination of factors, mostly due to human activity, have caused their populations to plummet. Today, they are among the rarest turtles in southern New England. They are state listed in Rhode Island, Massachusetts, and Connecticut.
Since they live on land and in the water, wood turtles are significantly impacted when both of these habitats are degraded. Interestingly, in the western portion of their range, wood turtles are typically more aquatic, while in their eastern range they are more terrestrial.
While these turtles prefer heavily vegetated banks and sandy stream bottoms, they can be found in woodlands and grasslands, and usually no further than a quarter-mile from water.
They don’t reach sexual maturity until they are 14-18 years old. They like to sit in sunny spots on riverbanks and try to blend in, rather than fleeing from predators, making them relatively easy for both predators and humans to catch. Their bright coloration makes them popular in the pet trade and a prime target for wildlife traffickers.
Wood turtles, which have been proposed for inclusion on the federal endangered species list, are found from Virginia to southern Canada and west to Minnesota. Sporting orange patches on their neck and legs, they spend time in slow-moving rivers and streams and in forests, croplands, and pastures. They nest in open sandy areas, weigh 2-3 pounds, and are 6-9 inches long. They can live up to 40 to 60 years.
They are threatened by habitat loss and fragmentation from the construction of roads, houses, and parking lots.
The Massachusetts Division of Fisheries & Wildlife noted hatchling and juvenile survival is low and the time to sexual maturity is long.
“Adult survivorship must be very high to sustain a viable population,” according to Bay State officials. “These characteristics make wood turtles vulnerable to human disturbances. Population declines have likely been caused by hay-mowing operations, development of wooded stream banks, roadway casualties, incidental collection of specimens for pets, unnaturally inflated rates of predation in suburban and urban areas, forestry and agricultural activities, and pollution of streams.”
In Connecticut, wood turtles have become increasingly rare due to their complex habitat needs, according to the Department of Energy & Environmental Protection. They have become more scarce in Fairfield County because of the fragmentation of suitable habitat by development.
The wood turtle was placed under international trade regulatory protection in 1992 through the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species. They were added to the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s Red List as a vulnerable species in 1996.
Wood turtles, however, are hardly the only species impacted by economic growth.
“Human development has divided turtle habitat into small pieces, resulting in islands of resources separated by roads and other uninhabitable landscapes,” according to the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management. “This is especially detrimental to turtles since they require both wetland habitats and adjacent upland habitats for nesting. Because they take so long to reach sexual maturity and many populations are isolated, removing just one reproductive adult has the potential to destroy an entire population.”
Both reptiles (turtles, snakes, and lizards) and amphibians (frogs, toads, and salamanders) are poikilothermic — often referred to as “cold-blooded” animals — which means that they can’t regulate their body temperatures as birds and mammals do.
They do, however, have behavior mechanisms to warm up, such as basking on sunny days, and they survive in the winter by hibernating in the relative warmth below ground or buried in the mud at the bottom of ponds.
During the winter, when turtles enter a dormant state (brumate), their bodies slow down and they require little oxygen and energy to live.
The following is a look at the turtles in southern New England listed as a species of concern, threatened or endangered:
Blanding’s turtle: Listed as threatened in Massachusetts. These turtles use a variety of wetland and terrestrial habitats. They have been observed in seasonal pools, marshes, scrub-shrub wetlands, and open uplands. Habitat use appears to vary according to the individual and the amount of precipitation, with more upland utilization during dry years. Wetlands are used for overwintering during their inactive season (November-March).
These turtles are particularly vulnerable because they travel long distances during their active season, don’t reproduce until late in life (14-20 years), and have low nest and juvenile survivorship. Roads are the primary cause of adult mortality.
They have a dark body and a bright yellow throat and grow up to 9 inches long. They inhabit a variety of habitats, and eat both plants, such as duckweed and sedges, and animals, like fish and snails.
This species can be confused with the eastern box turtle. The latter can have a yellow chin, but lacks the yellow throat and neck of the Blanding’s turtle. Box turtles are also smaller.
Bog turtle: Listed as endangered in both Massachusetts and Connecticut. This species is the rarest turtle in both states. It has a discontinuous and localized distribution extending from Berkshire County in Massachusetts, through western Connecticut, southern New York, New Jersey, eastern Pennsylvania, and southward in the Appalachian Mountains to Georgia. They inhabit low-lying, open calcareous wetlands, notably fens.
Intensive development pressure in all portions of the turtle’s range has caused the draining and filling of suitable wetland habitat.
This turtle is just 3-4 inches long, with a bright yellow spot on either side of its head. They mostly eat invertebrates such as slugs and insect larvae. During the winter, they hibernate underwater in deep areas of bogs in about 6-18 inches of mud.
Eastern box turtle: Listed as a species of concern in both Massachusetts and Connecticut. Although they occur in many municipalities in Massachusetts, they are more heavily concentrated in the southeastern section of the state. In Connecticut, they are found throughout the state, except at the highest elevations.
This terrestrial turtle can be found in many types of habitats — in both dry and moist woodlands, brushy fields, thickets, marsh edges, bogs, swales, fens, stream banks, and well-drained bottomland.
It eats many plant and small animal species. In the late afternoon, it builds a domelike structure from grasses or leaves in which to spend the night. Box turtles can lay fertilized eggs up to four years after mating.
Northern diamondback terrapin: Listed as endangered in Rhode Island, threatened in Massachusetts, and as a species of concern in Connecticut. There are no other brackish water turtle species in southern New England. They are found along the Atlantic Coast from Massachusetts south to Florida and along the Gulf Coast.
This coastal species inhabits estuaries and mud flats, grows up to 9 inches long, and eats snails, small crustaceans, worms, and some aquatic plants. To survive in salty environments, it excretes excess salt through orbital glands.
They can become trapped and then drown in submerged crab and lobster pots. During the nesting season, many females are killed as they attempt to cross coastal roads in search of nesting areas. During the early 1930s, when terrapin numbers decreased, the popularity of this turtle as a human food faded.
Northern red-bellied cooter: Listed as endangered in Massachusetts. This species is currently confined to ponds and rivers within Plymouth County and eastern Bristol County. This turtle, up to 12 inches long, looks somewhat like a painted turtle but lacks the two yellow markings behind the eyes. The lower shell is pink in males and red in females.
It prefers freshwater ponds with basking sites and aquatic vegetation, and mostly eats plants, but may occasionally consume fish or tadpoles.
Spotted turtle: Listed as a species of concern in Connecticut. This species has a somewhat disjunct range in North America. It occupies the eastern portion of the Great Lakes region from Ontario south to Illinois and west to Michigan. It also is found along the East Coast from southern Maine to Florida. Isolated populations also occur in southern Quebec, southern Ontario, central Illinois, central Georgia, and north central Florida.
This turtle can grow up to 4.5 inches long. They have a smooth, dark shell with little yellow polka dots. They live in wet meadows, marshes, bogs, small ponds, and slow-moving streams. They mostly eat animals, such as worms and frogs, but will occasionally eat plants.
Wood turtle: Listed as a species of concern in Rhode Island, Massachusetts, and Connecticut. They can be found across the northeastern United States into parts of Canada. They range from Nova Scotia through New England, south into northern Virginia, and west through the Great Lakes region into Minnesota.
They spend most of the spring and summer in mixed or deciduous forests, fields, hay fields, and riparian wetlands, including wet meadows, bogs, and beaver ponds. Then they return to streams in late summer or early fall to their favored overwintering location.
Note: Some of the species listed in each state overlap, and how often the lists are updated varies — the Rhode Island list was last updated in March 2006, Massachusetts last August, and Connecticut in January 2023. For species listed as state historical — essentially extirpated — in Rhode Island, they were included in the endangered category.
