Ornate box turtles, as their name suggests, have rich decorative colors and patterns, with bright yellow lines radiating across the dark upper and lower shells of both young and old specimens.

The patterns on box turtle shells are meant to emulate dappled light coming through trees to help the animals camouflage in their native forests of eastern North America.

Box turtles also have a hinged plastron (bottom shell) that allows them to close up shop in the front and rear, creating a “box” that protects their entire body from predators. Formerly, the eastern ...

Cape May, Naturally is a twice-monthly column about nature written by a rotating cast of experts at the New Jersey Audubon. I ...

Each is identifiable by distinctive body features or patterns on their shells. Ebert and other breeders can cross the different localities to create hybridized tortoises with unique marbled shell ...

A central Pennsylvania brother and sister recently encountered a box turtle that they first saw in 1967.

This wrinkled ol' pal, found across much of the U. S., may be in decline. A huge study in North Carolina plans to track box turtles for 100 years, to learn how to best protect them.

Once common here, the box turtle's ability to close their shells protects them from raccoons but not from habitat destruction or humans that capture them for pets.