ALLIGATORS AND ALLIGATOR TURTLES

      The well-known American alligators and the not-so-well-known alligator snapping turtles have several characteristics in common.  Both are massive reptiles that look like relics of the dinosaur age, which they are. Both species have thick scales, massive heads, long tails, powerful legs, webbed toes and long claws.  Both species are cold-blooded, apex predators, carnivorous and scavengers, and camouflaged in rivers, lakes and wetlands.  Both are fairly common in the southeastern and southcentral United States and are potentially dangerous to people.  Both are exciting to see, but not often seen because they blend into their habitats well.  And females of both kinds annually lay clutches of several eggs on land. 

     But these reptile species also have unique traits.  Alligators have long, powerful swimming tails and lengthy snouts, each with a mouthful of teeth they use to grab any kind of creature they can subdue.  

     Female alligators lay eggs in vegetation they piled up to hide their eggs.  That rotting vegetation also produces heat that help the embryos grow in their eggs.  Each female guards her clutch from raccoons, skunks, herons and other predators until the young hatch and go out on their own.   

     Adult male alligator snapping turtles can weigh up to 250 pounds, while females might weigh 62 pounds.   Males and females each have three rows of hard bumps on their top shells that protect them, and are deep-brown in color which camouflages them on the muddy bottoms of rivers and lakes where they ambush fish and other types of prey.  Algae grows on the shells and scales of these turtles, helping them to blend into their habitats.  Like all turtles, they don't have teeth, but do have hard, sharp mouth edges and large jaws that come to a point in front.  

     Alligator snapping turtles lurk quietly on the bottoms of rivers and lakes where they prey on fish, frogs, crayfish and other aquatic critters.  Each turtle has a worm-like appendage on the end of its tongue that it wiggles while its mouth is wide open.  Fish and other animals regard that appendage as edible and close in to grab and swallow it.  But these turtles quickly snap their jaws shut, snaring the fish or other intended victim.     

     Female alligator snapping turtles lay their clutches of eggs in soil and abandon them.  The heat of the sun warms the ground, the turtle eggs and the embryo inside each one.  Adult turtles don't have predators, except people, but their eggs and small young are eaten by striped skunks, raccoons, herons and other kinds of predators.  

     American alligators and alligator snapping turtles appear as relics from the dinosaur age.  And for that reason they are exciting to see, but from a distance.  They are both apex predators with deadly bites, and often hard to spot.  Be careful in the known ranges of these ancient creatures.       

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