SHORT STUDIES OF TURTLES. 2V3 



vitality to enjoy a midday outing, and vigor sufficient to 

 enable it to return to its quiet underground retreat 

 toward the close of the day. In most ponds of any con- 

 siderable extent, frequented by turtles, there are one or 

 more deep holes wherein many of the different species 

 are found to take refuge after the first hard or plant- 

 killing frost. Here they remain, in the deeper and 

 warmer water of these holes, when the shallower portions 

 of the ponds are coated with ice. Now, do they lie in 

 the mud in these holes in a torpid condition ? 



Throughout the winter, in these same deep holes, I 

 have found that many of our fish also congregate ; and 

 the turtles, to a certain extent, during the winter prey 

 upon these fish ; the snappers occasionally catching one, 

 and the other turtles feeding upon the remains of the 

 snapper's feast. What first gave me this impression was 

 the fact that I frequently found in nets set under the ice, 

 even in midwinter, fishes that had been partially eaten ; 

 and as this occurs quite often in summer, I took it for 

 granted that the offender a turtle was the same in each 

 case. Led by this inference, I baited hooks and placed 

 them in the deep holes of a large pond, and in several 

 instances succeeded in catching specimens of the stinking 

 or musk-turtle. 



Snappers, in the same way, have been caught during 

 the severest cold weather, in the deep holes in ponds, and 

 about large springs that discharge their waters on level 

 ground. It would seem, therefore, that if the water re- 

 mains above the freezing-point, these turtles continue 

 in a fairly active state, even though they do not find any 

 large amount of food. In such spring-holes, the grass 

 remains green throughout winter ; a few frogs linger in 

 the waters ; an occasional bittern haunts the spot ; pike, 

 too, are not unusual, and the snapper therefore has com- 



