TURTLES AND BATRACHIANS OF THE LAKE REGION. 477 



It walks along with a slow, awkward, halting gait, often stopping, holding 

 its head well up as if listening or looking about. When traveling about on the 

 land, a great amount of mud may sometimes be seen on the back. The back 

 or carapace is always rough and more or less covered with mud, and there 

 is often a heavy growth of filamentous algse on the back, the algae being gen- 

 erally some species of Microspora. 



The Snapper is a vicious brute. When attacked it neither retreats nor 

 withdraws into its shell as most species do, but shows fight at once, snapping 

 viciously at any object held near it. It will even leap forward toward its 

 tormentor. When its jaws have once closed on the enemy it holds on with 

 dog-like persistence. Dr. Hay mentions a curious belief with which the 

 writers have been familiar since boyhood days, viz. — that a Snapper when a 

 hold has once been secured will not let go until it thunders. Another version 

 of this superstition with which we are also familiar is that the turtle will hold 

 on until the sun goes down. They may frequently be carried around for 

 sometime by the stick which they have seized. 



These turtles are carnivorous and very voracious. Their food consists of 

 frogs, fishes, crawfishes, young waterbirds, and such other small animals as 

 they can capture. Several stomachs examined at the lake all contained 

 opercula and fragments of Vivipara coniedoides, indicating that this moUusk 

 IS the principal food of this species of turtle at the lake during certain parts 

 of the year. That they sometimes capture young ducks and goslings, catch- 

 ing them by the feet and pulling them under the water, seems well authentic- 

 ated. 



They evidently bury themselves in mud in swamps, frequently some dis- 

 tance from the lake, and hibernate in winter. A single, rather large individual 

 was seen under the ice (Lost Lake, December 18, 1900.) It was close up 

 against the ice, which was chopped away, and the turtle, which was ap- 

 pprently too benumbed to pay any attention to what Avas going on, was taken 

 out. It was kept alive over night in a coop and the temperature, which was 

 somewhat higher than freezing (35°) kept the turtle in such a benumbed 

 condition that it could hardly move by morning. 



These turtles began coming out of the mud about the middle of March, 

 the first one having been seen ISIarch 19. From then they came out one by 

 one, and from that time on they continued to be seen on land until through 

 the nesting season. In the fall they were to be seen about the lake as late as 

 the end of September. It is possible that the young turtles spend their first 

 winter in the Avater or near it; they are usually seen about the water's edge 

 and in pools early in the spring. On April 3, one about the size of a dollar 

 was caught in a pool east of the railroad. The first winter appears to be a 

 critical period in their lives; quite a number of small ones were found dead 

 at the water's edge in early spring, between April 3 and April 26. 



They begin laying about the middle of June. Several were seen on or 

 about nests between June 14 and 20. The nests consist simply of holes made 



