Well, yesterday I promised we would learn about an animal completely different from the turtle and the tortoise.  I looked high and I looked low but I think I finally found the perfect animal.  Of course, I am talking about the Diamondback Terrapin which is not even remotely close to the turtle and the tortoise.  Tell me you are not impressed with how different this animal is.  What do you mean they look just like the other two animals we talked about this week?  Okay, so maybe you are right, perhaps the Terrapin is just another common name used for turtles.  At the end of the day, all three  (turtle, tortoise and terrapin) belong to the order Chelonia and are basically very similar.

The Diamondback Terrapin is actually a species of turtle that resides in the brackish, coastal swamps of southern and eastern United States.  So if it is a turtle species, why is it called “Terrapin”?  Good question!  Besides making things confusing, in the old days, the early settlers use to call any turtle that lived in these type of coastal swamps as a Terrapin. In North America, the term is still commonly used for these brackish water turtles.

It is believed that the Diamondback Terrapin is the only turtle that spends the majority of their time in these brackish waters.  If you are still trying to figure out what a “brackish water” is, it is basically the transition zone between the ocean and freshwater systems.  It has some salt but not nearly as much as the ocean.  Although, the Diamondback Terrapin enjoys hanging out in these salty transition zones, they will still come up to the beach to lay their eggs.  And why not, right? Everyone enjoys a nice beach vacation every now and again.

Diamondback Terrapin Fast Fact – If you look closely at the skin of the Diamondback Terrapin (actually, you don’t even have to look that closely) you will notice that they have a pattern of black spots and lines. Apparently, this pattern is different for every individual Diamondback Terrapin so it acts like their fingerprint.  The police would have their work cut out for them if they had to get the fingerprints from a nefarious Terrapin.

Seriously, this is the last turtle fact of the week.  I just wanted to highlight the differences and similarities of the Turtle, Tortoise and Terrapin.  Basically, they are all turtles with different common names, typically as a result of their habitat preference (i.e. water, land, brackish waters).  I hope you enjoyed our turtle facts.