#soft shell turtle

[yourlocalartestpluto]

Was working on a comic and uhh- yeah!

[bethanythebogwitch]

Wet Beast Wednesday: spiny softshell turtle

It may be neither Flat Fuck Friday nor Turtle Tuesday, but because this is my series and I can do what I want, I'm talking about a very flat turtle. The spiny softshell turtle (Apalone spinifera) is the most widely distributed and possibly the most common softshell turtle in North America. Its range covers most of the Eastern half of the USA and stretched into Canada and Mexico. There are 6 subspecies separated by geography and hybridization can happen in places where their ranges cross. Hybridization has also been known to happen with the Florida softshell (Apalone ferox). The subspecies are the northern (A. s. spinifera), gulf coast (A. s. aspera), Texas (A. s. emoryi), pallid (A. s. pallida), Guadalupe (A. s. guadalupensis), and black (A. s. atra) spiny softshells.

(Image: a spiny softshell turtle seen from above and to the side. It is a turtle with a wide, flat shell. Its head and one foot are visible. The head is skinny and has an elongated nose. The foot is wide and flat, with webbed toes. The turtle is an olive green with black dots on the skin, yellow stripes on the face, and dark spots on the shell. End ID)

The thing that makes a softshell a softshell is the lack of keratinized scutes on their shells. This makes the shells smooth and leathery. The center of the shell has a layer of solid bone user it, but this does not extend to the edges of the shell, making it less rigid. Softshells are the fragile speedsters of the turtle world. Their shells are a lot lighter and often more streamlined, allowing for faster movement both on land and in water, but they provide less defense. Spiny softshells have spiny projections along the front edge of the carapace (upper shell), with males having more than females. They are some of the largest North American freshwater turtles. Females can reach a carapace length of 54 cm (21 in) and 11 kg (25 lbs) while the smaller males max out at about 25 cm (10 in).

(Image: a spiny softshell being held by a person, seen from the front. The leading edge of the carapace is visible, showing off the small spines. End ID)

Spiny softshells have wide, flat, paddle-like feet with three claws and an elongated nose that acts like a snorkel. The turtles are born a bright olive color with striped faces and dark spots on the shell. Males keep their juvenile coloration for their entire lives while females grow darker ad lose many of their markings. It can be very difficult to tell females of different subspecies apart, while males and juveniles can be distinguished by their markings. Smooth skin and highly vascularized membranes in the cloaca, mouth, and throat allow the turtles to breathe by diffusing dissolved oxygen from the water into their blood.

(Image: a male and female spiny softshell facing each other. The male is less than half the size of the female and has an olive colored shell and skin, with dark spots on the shell. The female is a uniform muddy brown color. End ID)

Spiny softshells are generalists able to live in a wide range of habitats. They prefer streams, rivers, and ponds with muddy or sandy bottoms and high visibility, but can live in most freshwater habitats. Softshells are diurnal, spending their days basking and feeding. Being turtles, they are ectothermic, meaning their body temperature matches the surrounding temperature. To warm themselves up, the turtles bask in the sunlight. They can often be found resting on exposed rocks, logs, sandbars, or shorelines. While not particularly social animals, the turtles will bask in groups. When threatened, softshells will attempt to swim away and/or bury themselves. In the right sediment, a softshell can bury itself in under a second. Because their shells are less rigid, softshells have to actively defend themselves when cornered and will bite and scratch. People have to be careful when handling them. They brumate (that's hibernation for reptiles) during winter. While brumating, they bury themselves underwater and slow their metabolism and oxygen requirements. In this state they can fully sustain themselves on oxygen absorbed through their skin or special membranes.

(Image: a spiny softshell turtle buried in its hunting strategy. Only the head is visible above the sand. End ID)

They are primarily carnivores and will eat anything that can fit in their mouths. Aquatic insects, crayfish, worms, amphibians, mussels, snails, fish, and more are on their plate. While capable of fast swimming, they are not pursuit predators. They employ two primary hunting strategies. The first is to bury themselves in the sediment and wait for prey to come by. The second is digging in the sediment to find worms and other animals. Fish have been known to follow digging turtles around to feed on animals unearthed by them.

(Image: a spiny softshell in captivity. It is swimming at the surface of the water in a tank, amongst artificial leaves. End ID)

Spiny softshells mate in spring. Males attempt to woo females by swimming over to them and bumping heads together. The male then sits on top of the female to mate. Unlike most species of turtles, the males do not grab onto the female's shells during mating. Eggs are laid between summer and early fall and will hatch next spring. The female will dig a nest in sandy or gravelly banks and bury the eggs once they have been laid. She provides no further care. Females will typically mate multiple times each year, with each mating having a different nest. The juveniles take 8 to 10 years to reach sexual maturity and they can live up to 50 years in the wild. Many turtles determine sex by the temperature the eggs are incubated in. This is not the case with spiny softshells, who have genetics based sex determination.

(Image: a group of 5 juveniles. The photo focuses on two who are sitting next to each other. One has its front right leg on the shell of the other. They have similar coloration to an adult male. End ID)

(Image: a newborn emerging from its egg. The egg is round and white, looking like a ping-pong ball. Only the head of the turtle has emerged. End ID)

Most subspecies of spiny softshell are classified as least concern or near threatened by the IUCN, meaning they are not in danger of extinction. The exception is the black spiny softshell, also known as the Cuatro Ciénegas softshell, which is critically endangered. The primary threats to the turtles is habitat loss due to human activity. Adults have no natural predators outside of the Florida and adjacent state populations, which are prey to alligators. Juveniles are eaten by a variety of animals including fish, snakes, raccoons, and herons. People will also eat the adults. Because it can take a whole decade for juveniles to become reproductive, losses in population take a long time to replace. They have been introduced to areas outside of their native range, most notably the western USA. Most of these introductions are due to people releasing pet turtles into the wild.

(Image: someone holding a juvenile. The shell is 2-3 times the size of the human's thumb. End ID)

[notanimalspirit]

Soft shelled turtle or smth

[tillimillimylitog]

Caught him!! All he needs is a purple mask, battle shell, and bo staff

HELP HE’S MULTIPLYING

[katieczar]

soft shell turtle study in gouache

[roxstar-artstuff]

A second redesign of my tmnt version with change to the kinds of turtles

[horangislittletiger99]

soft shell turtles are ugly as all helll

Head lookin like a dick in a foreskin

Fuckers even got teeth

Flat as a fuckin pancake

ugly ass bitch

They wanna be snapping turtles so bad but they can't

They're not scary enough

And they look like doofuses

[theworldoutsidethecave]

[rroastbeeff]

Literally just me and my bf as old men (hes the soft shell turtle)

[hidesinthedark]

Caught a wild pancake today

[grimspire-crossing]

Barry the Soft-Shell Turtle

(It's on my bucket list to touch a soft-shell turtle. They look so scrunkly!)

[fmd-art]

Biblically accurate Rise turtles, with Raf who is basically Gamera and I died a little inside drawing Donnie...

[turtleblogatlast]

I adore the idea of Leo developing a love for glam rock not only because he likes the music but also because of how many glam rock bands had vibrant and extravagant eye makeup - looks that his own red stripes were right at home with.

Like just imagine a little Leo rifling through his dad’s music and choosing to vibe with glam rock specifically because he was like “:0! Like me!:)”

[calculust-prime]

Born to dilly-dally

Forced to lock in.

[the-apple-juice]

Teaching kids how to make turtle family paper crafts, is what Mikey was born for :] @littlemissartemisia

[@tmnt-fandom-family-reunion Misa from cabin two and HIASS leo and mike from cabin thirteen 👍🏾]

[squishycat330]

Donnie! I finally did my 2012 & 2018 Donnie mix! (its been 3 weeks and 5 days. . . I’m so sorry)

he’s! Here! He’s finally Here!!!!

another run down, one last time!

In the 2018 series the boys are all different types of turtles, Leo is a Red-eard Slider, Raph is a Alligator-Snapping turtle, Mikey is a simple box turtle and Donnie is a Soft shell turtle (shudders), in the 2012 series Donnie says that he suspects their Common-Box turtles and/or Diamond-Back Terrapins.

So they’re all different turtles and Donnie is by far the most complicated, he’s a Diamond-Back Terrapin and a soft shell turtle. His shell is a mixture of both a normal shell and a softshell, it’s thinner and smoother then his brothers, but harder then a normal softshell, the outer part of the shell is soft wall the inner area is harder his scuts are oddly but consistently shaped and a bit thicker,

his plastron is similar to his shell and is softer as well, it’s more rounded and is flush with his chest/skin (if that makes any since) the plastron and shell blend together similarly

I really like the design I gave in his shell it looks nice, tho is gives off bohemian vibes which isn’t Donnie, it was also much easier to draw it digitally then traditionally, I also drew the traditional one first (because I’d dropped this for a bit). his shell is probably one of my favorites! (More on this in a moment)

Donnie also has a cover/armor for his shell!

It’s made out of recycled Kraang metal since it’s probably pretty durable and strong, he painted it purple because Donnie. It’s got holes for his belt and loops for his Bo-staff, and he’s attached something to his plastron that clips in to place with the pice on his shoulder, he made it after he got an injury to his shell early on, I actually looked up how ‘fixing’ turtle shells work when their injured to understand how it’d go for Donnie and I did end up coming up with something,

the outer bit is stitched wall the inner is sealed with zip ties and ‘command hooks’ or Resin and Fiber-Glass (or whatever that stuff is)

Donnie takes more after the soft-shell with his general shell wall his scuts are supposed to be the Diamond-back terrapin, tho the spotting on his shell I made to match a softshell turtle and how their typical drawn, he’s also a ✨lanky✨ boy and I think it could possibly come from the soft-shell turtle.

he’s so adorable! I love his cute lil face so much!!!

I just really love this drawing! He’s so freaking cute!!! His lil markings and smile! And eyes he’s just so adorable! I love it so much!!!

much like how I did Leo I thought Don having less specks in comparison to his brothers fit him,

I didn’t have to many problems with Donnie drawing wise. . . . (remembers that I had exactly 3 problems with this boy right off the bat. . .)

(yeah the three problems where his side in between his shell and plastron because at the time I hadn’t worked that out yet, the other problem was the fact that he was the only one with a neck. . . Yeah, all of the other turtles are at angles where the neck isn’t visible Donnie’s however (Mr. Soft-shell long neck boy) is and that was annoying for me. . . And I don’t actually remember what the last one was so yeah thanks Don!!!) But~ it was mostly just figuring out how to mix his shell tho, which was vary hard and I had to look up a lot about soft shell turtles, it was a lot more research then I did for the other boys, it was a nightmare looking at all of those softshell turtles. . . .their creepy and kinda disgusting but also vary interesting. . . I don’t know. . .it’s weird. . .

I actually proposed the idea for his shell to a friend who side it was actually really good and provided the idea for his plastron! So big thanks to them!

I also wanted to give him glasses and his goggle like things but I couldn’t figure that out digitally so I didn’t add them I may do that at another point tho since it’s a cute idea!

that’s the last of em! Donnie now completes the 4 turtles collection!

now moving on from that: the thing that finally motivated me to finish Donnie was actually what now goes Along with this which I’ll be working/posting on soon ;> I’d also point out Donnie took about 2h in general, so probably the least out of all of them which is funny,

id also say the first time I got distracted by drawing Donnie was to draw something by brother had suggested and it’s. . . .a disaster stupid funny disaster, then I just kinda never picked it back up and switched to traditional for a bit so yeah sorry Donnie!

Leo: Raph: Mikey:

Miscellaneous:. karai, Casey, April, shinigami, Renet