Bruce is a surprisingly picky eater! This has caused his mommy many, many stressful days and nights, worrying that he isn’t eating enough or enough variety to stay healthy and strong. It doesn’t help that, aside from the collection of water turtles we routinely rescued, cared for and released when I was a youngster, MaltiContinueContinue reading “Bruce Explains Box Turtles: Feeding”
Tag Archives: box turtle
Bruce Explains Box Turtles: Turtle Safe Greenery
Keeping the shelled family members’ outdoor enclosures suitably outfitted with all the right accessories – swimming pool, hides, diverse walking surfaces, edible (or at least turtle-safe) greenery – can turn even the most brown-thumbed individual into an aspiring gardener. Here, I speak from direct personal experience. When Malti was little, she lived indoors with meContinueContinue reading “Bruce Explains Box Turtles: Turtle Safe Greenery”
Bruce Explains Box Turtles: Safety Checks
For a wild rescued box turtle, Bruce can be surprisingly social. Right from the start, he was keen to interact – on his terms. His terms meant lots of staring, plenty of running around on the floor back and forth, and occasionally coming to stand on top of my feet. During his first week withContinueContinue reading “Bruce Explains Box Turtles: Safety Checks”
Bruce Explains Box Turtles: Hay
When I was little, I thought hay was for horses. Later on I learned hay is also for guinea pigs, rabbits, hamsters and sheep. Now I know that hay can be for chickens and cows too (to roost on and eat, respectively). But never in a million years did I suspect a box turtle mightContinueContinue reading “Bruce Explains Box Turtles: Hay”
Bruce Explains Box Turtles: Estivation
Bruce is a three-toed box turtle. Specifically, he is a Texas 3-toed box turtle (eastern box turtle), which means his species is found here in Texas naturally in certain wild places, mostly in the eastern parts of the state. But just because Bruce is from Texas doesn’t mean our legendary summer heat doesn’t get toContinueContinue reading “Bruce Explains Box Turtles: Estivation”
Bruce Explains Box Turtles: The Wild
Bruce really comes alive when he is out and about in the “wild,” which these days basically means his outdoor habitat or in his enclosed backyard play area. He runs about, climbing and digging and exploring and hunting and hiding and swimming and just generally being a wild box turtle. I love this! I loveContinueContinue reading “Bruce Explains Box Turtles: The Wild”
Bruce Explains Box Turtles: Soaking
Box turtles are truly an enigma of sorts in the turtle/tortoise world. Sometimes they seem more like terrapins or water turtles, with their water-loving personalities and tendency to go for a “swim” in any little pond or puddle they encounter. But then at other times, especially while hibernating under layers of dirt and mulch orContinueContinue reading “Bruce Explains Box Turtles: Soaking”
Bruce Explains Box Turtles: Protein
Figuring out what to feed a newly rescued box turtle is not a job for the faint of heart (or mind). When Bruce first joined our little flock in May 2015, I figured he would probably like whatever Malti liked. Boy was I wrong. To this day, Bruce has never deigned to even sniff Malti’sContinueContinue reading “Bruce Explains Box Turtles: Protein”
Bruce Explains Box Turtles: Eye Contact
When my Bruce came to me, he had been out wandering the dangerously busy urban streets around our neighborhood. I didn’t know anything about his history, except that he had at one time been plucked out of a wild area and transported to a neighbor’s backyard (the perpetrator in this case was the neighbor’s grandson).ContinueContinue reading “Bruce Explains Box Turtles: Eye Contact”
Bruce Explains Box Turtles: Earthworms
Sometimes I feel like I literally couldn’t have chosen two more opposite shelled beings to welcome into our little flock. Where Malti is slow, Bruce is quick. Where Malti is always one nap away from her next nap, Bruce is up and raring to go before most roosters are awake. And where Malti prefers herContinueContinue reading “Bruce Explains Box Turtles: Earthworms”
Love & Feathers & Shells 