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SCIENCE ALIVE! - Turtlely Awesome Facts

Added Mar 01, 2021 •

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Discuss the contents of our Endangered Turtles of Texas kit and share interesting facts and differences between semi-aquatic, red-eared sliders, and terrestrial box turtles.

Show Transcript

Welcome to another SCIENCE ALIVE! session titled "Turtlely Awesome Facts".   The next two upcoming videos after this are "Of course, It Rocks" and scheduled for February 11th "Boop the Sssnoot" featuring our snakes and our snake kit. Today, though, we will discuss the contents of our "Endangered Turtles of Texas" kit and share interesting facts and differences between semi-aquatic, red-eared sliders and terrestrial box turtles. My name is Peggy, and with me is Charlotte.  Charlotte is going to lead us through the contents of our kit. As you check it out, it will come in this nice bag. Not your boxes anymore. I had bags made and they have the Living Science logo on them and what's included in them is this cool binder that has lesson plans about the endangered leatherback. Activity and coloring book Sea turtle fact sheets and box turtle conservation info on their features their diet, etc. So, Charlotte, what is the age appropriate or grade appropriate range for this kit? For this kit on these lessons is for grades 6 thru 12 For information, activities and more 6 and 12, you can scale it down a little bit for elementary. Get a few facts out of it just some basic information We also have two posters. Posters talk about the sea turtles and the terrestrial and freshwater turtles What does terrestrial mean? It means they spend most of their life on land and they can be found "near" water. Probably shallower water. Much shallower water. They basically get inside and soak, but they don't go under it stay under like red eared sliders do. Texas Turtle University information on the back Got questions, and little information on them, and this one is on the sea turtles of the Gulf of Mexico this is what you can find down at the coast it features a call number if you see an endangered turtle or see a situation that needs rescue These posters were put out by the Texas Parks and Wildlife so if you want more information you can go to their website And then it also has three DVDs. One's an intro to threatened turtles and the other one is for Kemp's Ridley which is a sea turtle and then the other one is for the leatherback which is another sea turtle and then there is also a fold-out on Texas Turtles these are turtles that can be found in Texas not just in San Antonio but anywhere in Texas. It's two sided and it gives a little schematic as to what you can find where cause they're kind of labeled. This is a new feature this year, isn't it Charlotte? Absolutely, we did not have these before. But we have found, because they have so much information at hand, that these are good to see and it's good for people to know that there are a lot of different turtles out there. I think it's time to show the turtles. Well, let's get at it. I know they're anxious to come out.  This is one of our red-eared sliders. You can see the red stripe by the ear and looks like the stripe is a little faded. She's not a young turtle. She's an older turtle. I used to have a different color hair and it faded. Males usually have really long claws. All the turtles have the claws, but males tend to have real long claws and these are not in my opinion, male claws Females are usually larger than the males and they have a shorter tail Charlotte's bringing out our terrestrial box turtle and we do not check these out because we have limited supply but we do have them for comparison and we're happy to be able to show you both and you can tell the shell is more dome and if you happen to look at their feet she actually has toes, where the slider feet are webbed And she's anxious to get away, he is, and the reason why I say he is because if you look at the bottom got a little concave right there, a little indention and that is the difference between a male and a female right there and they're called box turtles because they can close themselves up tightly within their shell almost like clams and there's a, this is where their fold is, that's that bends so they can open or it'll slam shut like a hinge So, Charlotte, what are the key differences between the slider and the land turtle? The slider lives in water they have webbed feet. So, if you look at the difference right around the toes, they're webbed. Where a box turtle, they actually have toes. Their feeding habits are they eat live crickets, beetles, things like that. Water turtles can eat other fish and they like fruits and vegetables hearty greens; like spinach and kale no head lettuce, no iceberg things like that. There's too much water in it for them and it's not good for their stomach. And whoever said turtles were slow are wrong. They are pretty quick. Yeah, they are. And this guy sees an opportunity for escape we have three very interesting facts. Do we want to share? I guess we shared the first one about the difference between males and females. The second one is box turtles fall under the same family as our pond turtles belong in. And they can actually swim. And this is a recent interesting fact for me because they are terrestrial. But they're more closely related to the red eared slider than they are to a leopard tortoise. And fact three is they have great eyesight. They can see very clearly and they can see color like humans. And Charlotte, you were the one that confirmed that by how they go after their fruit, colorful fruit They are very partial to reds They love watermelons, tomatoes, strawberries They'll eat peaches but if you put the two fruits down, they'll take a watermelon or a red one over an orange. I've seen Mercedes put hibiscus petals (that are red) in the bowl too. That's a favorite. Thank you very much for being with us today for "Turtley Awesome Facts" We expect and hope to see your orders for our red-eared slider and our "Turtle Kits" have any questions feel free to contact us at www.livingscience@esc20.net or 210-370-5688 or 210-370-5688 We would be happy to help you and answer any questions you might have or get the answers if we don't know them Thank you and we'll see you next time. Bye.

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SCIENCE ALIVE! - Turtlely Awesome Facts

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