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I stopped once to move a big snapper but he wasn’t having it. A guy in a truck stopped around the same time and approached with a snow shovel with this sort of weary confidence, like he’d done this a thousand times.
He tapped it gently on the shell, then put the shovel in front of its face. The turtle chomped right on and he pulled it off the road. I don’t know if that was the right way to move it but it worked - mostly I was impressed he had a turtle-moving protocol (and shovel) ready to go.
I’ve had to move plenty of these snappy bastards out of traffic areas.
I use a thick pear of work gloves to keep from getting scratched and pick them up from the side, 9 and 3 spots. Back legs may try to kick/scratch but that’s what the gloves are for.
Hold far away from you, good chance they will pee.
Move them to a safe area and after a short while, they are back on their way safe and sound.
Turtle power 🐢
Only time I’ve ever witnessed them being handled was when we had someone come onto our property to trap them. We had hundreds in a 7 acre man made lake. Big problem for our ducks and stuff, so we wanted to thin their numbers.
Dude let my 9yo self accompany, and it was pretty neat. Learned to set and bait the traps and how to handle them.
He didn’t touch the shell at all, he gave them a short section of stick to bite and hold, and grabbed them by the tail. They only needed to be moved from the trap into the barrel, so that was fine. Idk if one would trust that to move them much further.
In a single trip around the traps, we’d usually get 20 or so full grown turtles. He ate them, so he was thrilled with free turtle, and we were thrilled to make the lake safer, also for free.
This is completely true. I did it this way once and now I have a cool prosthetic.
This works especially well with snapping turtles.
They are called that because they love the sound of snapping. Help your fingerless buddies out, snap your fingers! But their hearing isnt the best, be sure to do it right in front of their face so they are sure to notice :)
Just pick that mfer up they’ll be fine
My wish is to have a broken finger.
