Eastern Box Turtle Hatchling

     There must be an Eastern Box Turtle nest close by.  On Saturday, I was walking through my high grass, hoping things would be dry enough for the lawn guys to cut the grass tomorrow.  I looked down and saw a tiny box turtle.  The little guy (girl?) was about 1 to 1.25 inches in diameter.  Since fresh out of the egg hatchlings are about the size of a quarter (.95 inches), this specimen must have been very young.
      While it's probably best to leave the natural order alone,  I foresaw a gruesome death in this reptile's future if it hung around my yard - or any of the neighbors' yards - or the road.  A little googling told me that hatchling turtles have a high mortality rate.  Most don't live past the first year.  Besides fatal encounters with humans (and their lawn equipment and cars), they are food for snakes, birds, and other animals.  If they don't dig deep enough into the ground for their first winter hibernation, they freeze and never see their second spring.
     I figured the best shot for this little one was to be relocated to the park, away from the parking lot and the trails, near water and soft earth.  So, that's where we went.

So Little
Remember those green turtles that were popular pets in the 1950s and 1960s?  They disappeared from the stores in 1975 by order of the FDA.  Just about all turtles carry salmonella.  Children, who love to touch small animals, then go about their business touching their faces and putting their fingers in their mouths, never having washed their grubby, little hands, were getting sick.  Box turtles, while healthy themselves, carry salmonella on their bodies.  I used a handy dog poop bag to grab this guy.  I deposited him in a crumb butler (which serves as an ash tray for visiting smokers) that sits outside on a table.      

I headed to the park.

Eastern Box Turtles have an average life expectancy of 50 years, but some can live to be 100 years old.  I hope I did the right thing by taking this turtle to the park.  Maybe it will still be there in the year 2100.  After sending a few more positive thoughts out into the universe, I went home and scrubbed thoroughly, up to my elbows.