NOTES ON THE REMARKABLE HABITS OF 

 CERTAIN TURTLES AND LIZARDS* 



By H. a. Largelamb 



THE ALLIGATOR SNAPPING TURTLE 



THE alligator snapping turtle (Ala- 

 crochelys lacertina) is fonnd in 

 the' Mississippi River and the 

 other rivers flowing into the Gulf of 

 Mexico, all the way from Texas to Flor- 

 ida and as far north as Missouri. 



Although turtles are not provided with 

 teeth, the bite of this giant turtle may well 

 be feared, for it is quite capable of snap- 

 ping off a finger or hand at a single bite. 

 It possesses a pair of keen-edge cutting- 

 mandibles and jaw muscles of great 

 power. It snaps off a large section of a 

 fish like a shad as cleanly as though re- 

 moved with a cutting die. It is unable, 

 however, to swallow its food unless its 

 head is completely immersed. If kept 

 in water too shallow for this, it would 

 starve in the midst of plenty. It could 

 take the food, but could not swallow it. 



The alligator snapping turtle, when 

 lying at the bottom of the muddy water 

 it frequents, can hardly be distinguished 

 from a great boulder stone embedded in 

 the mud. It is provided with a very re- 

 markable appendage, which it uses to 

 entice fish right into its mouth. The ap- 

 pendage is found on the inside of the 

 lower jaw, close to the region of the 

 tongue. Mr Raymond Lee Ditmars, in 

 his fascinating book upon Reptiles, says : 



"This is a well-developed filament of 

 flesh, white, and distinct from the yellow- 

 ish mouth parts, and resembling a large 

 grub to such a degree of nicety that the 

 popular-minded observer, seeing the ob- 

 ject in the reptile's mouth, would declare 

 it to be the larva of some insect. More 

 striking, however, is the reptile's power 

 to keep this appendage in motion, giving 

 it the aspect of crawling about in a small, 

 circular course. 



* A review of "The Reptile Book," by Raymond l^. Ditmars, Curator of Reptiles in the 

 New York Zoological Park, with 8 plates in color and more than 400 photographs from life. 

 Pp. 475. 10x8 inches. New York : Doiibleday, Page & Co. 1907. 



"With the mud-colored shell lying 

 close to the bottom, the jaws thrown open 

 to a great extent, this organ is put in 

 motion. Every other portion of the creat- 

 ure is as motionless as a rock. In this 

 position of rigidity the shell looks like a 

 great, round stone, and blotches of fine 

 waving moss intensify the deception ; the 

 big head looks like another stone, be- 

 neath which there is a cavern, and in this 

 cavern crawls the white grub, to all ap- 

 pearances, an object dear to the hearts 

 of finny wanderers. But woe to the luck- 

 less fish that swims within reach of those 

 yawning jaws." 



lizards' T.ails 



We are all more or less familiar with 

 the difficulty of catching lizards without 

 causing them to lose their tails. The tails 

 come off on the slightest provocation. 

 This decapitation — or, rather, decauda- 

 tion — is not of so much consequence to 

 a cold-blooded reptile as it would be to 

 a mammal, like a dog or cat ; for the 

 lizard soon grows another tail, which, 

 though it may not equal the original tail 

 in length, is )'et a good serviceable organ. 

 How man}- times the tail may be removed 

 and yet be replaced we do not know. 



The removal of the tail is not always 

 the result of violence, for some lizards, 

 the plated lizards, for example, are able 

 to discard the tail voluntarily in the face 

 of an enemy. The abandoned tail acts 

 as a decoy to the pursuer. The tail wrig- 

 gles and writhes and thrashes about with 

 such liveliness among the dead leaves 

 into which it is thrown as to distract the 

 attention of the pursuer, and thus the 

 original owner escapes. 



The glass "snake," which is really a 

 lizard, although it has no feet, is unable 

 to make much speed ; and for this reason 



