I’ve search everywhere for information about an aligator snapping turtal. A friend gave it to me as a pet. Can anyone help?
Try “alligator snapping turtle”
I keep a turle also, although not a snapper. If I knew where she actually belonged, I would return her, although she has lived with people so long that she may no longer be safe in the wild (I inherited her from neighbors who were moving into and apartment and could not keep her).
Try alligator snapping turtle in some of the search engines.
This is one I use a lot. It could be that your turtle is a member of an endangered or threatened species, and in that case, I would return it to its natural habitat, if that is possible.
Did you know that snapping turtles, if they get to be big, can seriously injure people or other pets?
If you decide to keep it after you find all the information, keep us posted, and good luck to you. 
http://officeupdate.microsoft.com/2000/articles/thesaurs.htm
http://www.nashvillezoo.org/asturtle.htm
AWB- Ahem
Little Rock-et-
This site will lay the foundation for what to do with it.
By the way, what was your friend thinking giving you one of these hideous creatures. From my experience, they’re vicious little bastards that can take your finger off on a whim.
A nice little box turtle named Fred wouldn’t have been better?
Welcome to the board!
You may want to start with a search through a search engine, like Google or Altavista, or you could do a directory search, like using Yahoo! and going to Yahoo! Pets.
So here’s a place to begin for general information.
More information from a turtle enthusiast, especially on care in captivity.
It may be illegal for you to have an Alligator Snapping Turtle as a pet in your state; the species is considered threatened in many areas:
Please contact your state Dept. of Fish and Game or Natural Resources to check.
If you can keep it, I recommend joining a local reptile or turtle club so you can get help and advice on its care.
Thanks for your help. But, I still can’t find any information about him. Can SOMEONE please, help???
Little Rock-et
Alligator snapping turtles are a threatened species. Please do the species a favor and return this turtle to the wild so that it can reproduce. Find a nice pond or river far from any roads and let the critter go.
But please please pleas only do as spoke mentioned above if you are in an area the Alligator Snapping Turtle is indigenous to! For example, not in California. It is indigenous to the southeastern U.S.
Thank you all again. Can some nice person please post a link for the exact spoet where I can find the infor mation. The turtal was sick when my friend gave it to me. He said he had it for a while. I plan on setting it free. But, not until it gets better. Please, someone help? I’m a little to hungover to think.
And found some info on why these things are so dangerous:
The Original Long-Forgotten Alligator Snapping Turtle Thread
BTW - they love to eat bologna, cut into strips. I had a little one for a while, which I kept until Spring. And they need water to sit and soak in.
Thank you all ever so much. You’ve been a big help. Here is a link to the best site I’ve found so far. If you want o take a peek at the little monster, Rusty, click on the link.
http://hometown.aol.com/nofxpunk99/asnap.html
Looks like a beautifull pet.
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- If it doesn’t have the little worm-shaped thing on its toungue, it is just a common snapper. Either way, it’s not the greatest choice for a pet, legality aside. One common problem with attempting to keep reptiles as pets is that you can’t tell they’re sick until they’re almost dead, and vets don’t have much medicines available for them. I’d just find someplace hospitable (if you live in the natural range, as said) and toss it in the water. Snapping turtles instinctively attack smaller animals, and their parents don’t teach them much - it’s all automatic.
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- If you can’t release it right away (or don’t want to), it’ll try anything but live fish is the healthiest thing to feed it.
- I recall that soft-shelled turtles are pretty damn mean too. - MC
I too, out of mis-placed compassion, tried to wrestle one off the highway out of the way of traffic. It snapped and hissed at me all the while until I managed to roll it off the highway with a tire iron.
The Tennessee Aquarium in Chattanooga has a beautiful specimen of this animal (well…beautiful for a snapping turtle…)
You can watch it as it sits on the bottom of the tank in its exhibit, holding its mouth open and flicking its tongue like a little pink worm to attract fish.
I found a baby one about the size of a dime once. Kept it for about a year or two. The thing (Attila) would eat all the balogna you you could throw at him. Later I started just putting feeder goldfish in the tank with him so he could feed himself.
CAUTION: They can be VERY dangerous!
After he got a little bigger, he seemed to try to bite my hand when I fed him. I finally started putting food on the end of a pencil, just in case. Sure enough one day he bit the pencil in two. And remember this was a baby!
They are smart enough to be aggressive to you personally.
Especially, do not let children near it.
Side note, they may be endangered in some places, but Texas is over-run with them. Biologist in my opinion are not particularly good at field counts.
I once caught a large one (16" across) and was carrying it home and was stopped by a guy headed to a flea-market. He tried to buy it, but I eventually traded it to him for a tandem bike. He said they brought a high price because their meat was a delicacy. Hmmmm…
What ever, got a bike out of the deal! True story.
Alligator snapping turtles, and all turtles, are good dinner. Says labdude the cajunman.
That first link that wevets gave says they’re not. I’m not sure why they would be. Do you have a reference?
I said they’re threatened in some areas. Check the 3rd and 4th links in my first post in this thread. These guys are pretty common in Texas, Arkansas, and Mississippi; but they’re declining or threatened in Kansas, Indiana, Missouri, and Louisiana (which apparently imports them for eatin’). One possible explanation is that the U. Michigan people (the source of my first link) don’t update their site very often: it contains a large number of taxa, and I imagine it’s taxing (Ha ha… I kill me! :D) to try to keep up with what’s going on with each one. Note that the page was last updated in 1997.
That sounds like a challenge to me, bub! I got my transect tape and quadrat right here! We’ll meet at high noon and draw (or count) at the count of three.
Ready?
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.
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Three!
