On a Deformed 



Specimen of Muklenberg's Turtle 

 R. W. 5HUFELDT, M. D. 



*> — 



Melanemys muhlenbergi 



In Nature-Study Review for 191 4, I 

 published an article with four figures, 

 entitled "Rare Deformity in a Painted 

 Turtle (Chrysemys picta), with Notes 

 on the Species" (pp. 218-222). One of 

 the illustrations showed that this young 

 turtle — for it was a small specimen — 

 possessed a peculiar and conspicuous 

 hump in the median line on top of the 

 carapace. Upon dissection, the cavity 

 within this remarkable elevation con- 

 tained no anatomical structures — in fact, 

 it was practically empty. Having seen 

 thousands of young turtles in my life- 

 time, representing nearly all the known 

 species of eastern North America, and 

 never having noted any such peculiarity 

 before, I naturally thought that a sec- 



Muhlenberg's Turtle 



ond example of it would never come to 

 hand ; in this, however. I was mistaken. 

 During the spring of 1920, Dr. Raymond 

 L. Ditmars, of the New York Zoological 

 Gardens, kindly presented me with a 

 rather young specimen of a female Muh- 

 lenberg's turtle, which possessed identi- 

 cally the same kind of a hump on its 

 back as did the specimen of the Painted 

 turtle referred to above, and which oc- 

 cupied the same part of the carapace in 

 the median line. This is well shown in 

 the accompanying photograph, made by 

 me shortly after the specimen was re- 

 ceived. 



This turtle was kept in a small aquar- 

 ium and fed with angling worms, which 

 it greatly relished, but I soon discovered 



