Yellow mud turtle (original) (raw)

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Species of turtle

Yellow mud turtle
In the Chihuahuan Desert, Texas
Conservation status
Least Concern (IUCN 3.1)[1]
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Reptilia
Order: Testudines
Suborder: Cryptodira
Family: Kinosternidae
Genus: Kinosternon
Species: K. flavescens
Binomial name
Kinosternon flavescens(Agassiz, 1857)
Synonyms[2]
List Cinosternon flavescens Agassiz, 1857 Platythyra flavescens — Agassiz, 1857 Cinosternum flavescens — Agassiz, 1857 Kinosternum flavescens — Cope, 1892 Kinosternon flavescens — Stone, 1903 Kinosternon flavescens flavescens — Hartweg, 1938 Kinosternon flavescens spooneri P.W. Smith, 1951 Platythyra flavenscens [sic] Raun & Gehlbach, 1972 (ex errore) Kinosternon spooneri — Collins, 1991

The yellow mud turtle (Kinosternon flavescens),[3] also commonly known as the yellow-necked mud turtle,[4] is a species of mud turtle in the family Kinosternidae. The species is endemic to the Central United States and Mexico.

Its current presence is uncertain in Veracruz (Mexico) and Arkansas (United States).[_citation needed_]

The yellow mud turtle is a small, olive-colored turtle. Both the common name, yellow mud turtle, and the specific name, flavescens (Latin: yellow), refer to the yellow-colored areas on the throat, head, and sides of the neck. The bottom shell (plastron) is yellow to brown with two hinges, allowing the turtle to close each end separately. The male's tail has a blunt spine on the end, but the female's tail does not.[_citation needed_]

The yellow mud turtle can live for more than 40 years.[5]

Yellow mud turtles are omnivorous. Their diet includes worms, crayfish, frogs, snails, fish, fairy shrimp, slugs, leeches, tadpoles, and other aquatic insects and invertebrates. They also eat vegetation and dead and decaying matter.[_citation needed_]

Yellow mud turtles forage on land and water for food. In early spring their main diet is fairy shrimp they find in the shallows of their ponds. While they are burrowing, they will eat earthworms or grubs they encounter. Some studies show these turtles will eat earthworms that pass in front of them while hibernating. They also consume fish and other aquatic organisms.[_citation needed_]

This species spends most of the year estivating underground, becoming active again when ponds refill from the summer monsoon season. If the amount of rain in a given year is inadequate, this species will remain underground until there is enough rain, and may remain underground for up to 24 months.[6]

Hatchling, Texas

Most female aquatic turtles excavate a nest in the soil near a water source, deposit their eggs and leave, but yellow mud turtles exhibit a pattern of parental care. They are the only turtle that has been observed that stays with the eggs for any period of time. The female lays a clutch of 1-9 eggs[7] and stays with the eggs for a period of time of a few hours up to 38 days. It is believed that the female stays to keep the predators away from the eggs. It was also observed that the females would urinate on their nests in dry years. This is believed to aid in the hatch success rate of the eggs in dry years.[_citation needed_]

It is believed that in their natural habitat that spring rains induce the turtles to begin nesting. The eggs hatch in the fall and some hatchlings leave the nest and spend the winter in aquatic habitats, but most of the hatchlings burrow below the nest and wait until spring to emerge and then move to the water. This is believed to aid in survival rates of the hatchlings, because some water bodies freeze solid during the winter. Another benefit of waiting to emerge in the spring is that hatchlings enter an environment of increasing resources, such as heat, light, and food.[_citation needed_]

  1. ^ van Dijk, P.P. (2016) [errata version of 2011 assessment]. "Kinosternon flavescens". IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. 2011: e.T163421A97380845. doi:10.2305/IUCN.UK.2011-1.RLTS.T163421A5604699.en. Retrieved 28 October 2022.
  2. ^ Fritz, Uwe; Havaš, Peter (2007). "Checklist of Chelonians of the World" (PDF). Vertebrate Zoology. 57 (2): 252. doi:10.3897/vz.57.e30895. ISSN 1864-5755. Archived (PDF) from the original on 1 May 2011. Retrieved 29 May 2012.
  3. ^ "Yellow Mud Turtle - Tucson Herpetological Society". Tucson Herpetological Society. Retrieved 2018-10-25.
  4. ^ Zim & Smith (1956), p. 23.
  5. ^ "Kinosternon flavescens (Yellow Mud Turtle)". IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Retrieved 2018-09-07.
  6. ^ Iverson, John B. (September 1989). "The Arizona Mud Turtle, Kinosternon flavescens arizonense (Kinosternidae), in Arizona and Sonora". The Southwestern Naturalist. 34 (3): 356–368. doi:10.2307/3672164. JSTOR 3672164.
  7. ^ O'Shea, Mark; Halliday, Tim (2010). Reptiles and Amphibians. London: Dorling Kindersley. p. 46. ISBN 978-1-4053-5793-7.

Data related to Kinosternon flavescens at Wikispecies