ID help?

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steven...@email.com

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Jun 4, 2025, 4:25:20 PM6/4/25
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On our hike today .. I’ve never encountered this color pattern ? Any ideas
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absolutsciverson

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Jun 4, 2025, 5:40:55 PM6/4/25
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I think its an Eastern Box turtle....

Carl Karasti

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Jun 4, 2025, 7:42:26 PM6/4/25
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That does appear to be an Eastern Box Turtle, which is not native to Minnesota, so it's probably a released pet.
Here's a range map.
Carl Karasti
image.png


On Wed, Jun 4, 2025 at 3:25 PM stevendillon via Ely Field Naturalists <elyfieldn...@googlegroups.com> wrote:

On our hike today .. I’ve never encountered this color pattern ? Any ideas

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clever...@gmail.com

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Jun 4, 2025, 8:19:35 PM6/4/25
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A friend once found one “in the wild” many years ago (and still has it), but it was in the Twin Cities urban area where the chances of a released/escaped pet being found are reasonably good. I’m curious if you encountered it in town or out in the woods.

 

Steve Wilson

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steven...@email.com

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Jun 5, 2025, 10:08:18 AM6/5/25
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It was on a trail in the woods … just outside of town.


On 6/4/25 at 7:19 PM, clever...@gmail.com wrote:

Mike Ruzich

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Jun 5, 2025, 12:19:45 PM6/5/25
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Funny aside. When I lived in southern Illinois, box turtles were very common. I had a dog that log carrying large rocks and then burying them. Once he picked up a rather dirty box turtle, probably just out of hibernation. He carried said turtle around for a while, and then reburied it.
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On Jun 5, 2025, at 9:08 AM, stevendillon via Ely Field Naturalists <elyfieldn...@googlegroups.com> wrote:



clever...@gmail.com

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Jun 5, 2025, 3:45:02 PM6/5/25
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Let’s hope it was an escapee and not a climate change refugee or were in much deeper do-do than I imagined.

Jesse Ellis

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Jun 5, 2025, 4:17:06 PM6/5/25
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Post on What's Up Ely FB group, perhaps? Or does WELY have the lost and found call in going yet? Sometimes they get out and wander, and you'd think someone would be looking for it.

However, I'm not sure how someone proves they're the true owner.


Jesse Ellis
Coe College Wilderness Field Station
3590 Cloquet Line



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Jesse Ellis, Ph. D. he/him/his
Director of the Wilderness Field Station
http://www.coe.edu/fieldstation
Associate Professor
Department of Biology
Coe College
1220 1st Ave NE,
Cedar Rapids, Iowa, 52402

The Wilderness Field Station is located on territory where Dakota and Anishinaabe (Ojibwe) lived. Although treaties with the United States government deprived both communities of much of their land in Minnesota, both continue to live in the state, as well as in neighboring states and in Canada.

Carl Karasti

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Jun 5, 2025, 4:29:24 PM6/5/25
to Jesse Ellis, clever...@gmail.com, steven...@email.com, Ely Field Naturalists
I don't think WELY is quite advanced enough yet in its latest reincarnation to have revived its lost and found service.

When I searched for the box turtle range map, I saw a couple of comments that it is quite common to find released, or perhaps escaped ?, box turtles simply because there are so many people who have (have had) box turtles as pets, perhaps because they are more appealing and more available than other turtles.

Carl Karasti

sparky stensaas

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Jun 8, 2025, 9:35:24 AM6/8/25
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Sadly, it is someone's escaped/released pet.
That is a Woodland Box Turtle (Terapene carolina carolina); a subspecies of Eastern Box Turtle.
They are NOT native to Minnesota.
In the midwest they are only in southern Michigan to southern Illinois.
It won't survive.

Sparky Stensaas
2515 Garthus Road
Wrenshall MN 55797

Friends of Sax-Zim Bog
Preserving & Protecting the Greater Sax-Zim Bog for Future Generations of Birds & Birders

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From: stevendillon via Ely Field Naturalists <elyfieldn...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Wednesday, June 4, 2025 3:25 PM
To: elyfieldn...@googlegroups.com <elyfieldn...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: {Ely Field Naturalists} ID help?
 

On our hike today .. I’ve never encountered this color pattern ? Any ideas

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