Plenty of Painted Turtles

An unusually large number of young Western Painted Turtles was observed by the author at a lake southeast of Thunder Bay in the summer of 1999. This fine specimen looked like it had just recently hatched. Many turtle eggs in the gravelly areas around the lake are dug up and eaten by Striped Skunks. This youngster was lucky just to see the light of day. Snapping Turtles inhabit the same lake, but no hatchlings were seen this summer, although one was photographed there by the author last year.