Never have seen one of these on our property the 23 years we have been here, and we only have a small creek. He crawled up to check the woodpile. About a foot long shell.
Maybe it liked your snappy looking wood stack! Did you redirect it? Wouldnt want to get bitten by one. Ive seen them in the road from time to time by the reservoir near my wood storage.
My brother ran one over a while back while bobtailing in his semi. It lodged between the duals and was thrown into the back of his sleeper like a rocket. Caved a part of it right in.
We have plenty down here in the swampy areas. I can't make out the shell well, but if it's "kinda" flat shell, it's a female, the males are more rounded on top. Males have a tendency to wander looking for a mate this time of year, I've never been bit, but don't get your hand close, they clamp on and won't let go. Not a bad creature to have around just watch if you have kids or dogs!
We get tons of them (30+) in our yard every year trying to lay eggs. They like the sandy soil. They often return to the same spot every year. Both of our dogs have gotten snapped. The one didnt like it and backed off. The other one took it as a challenge went bezerk and yanked the snappers head out and killed it. It looked like a snail that fell out of its shell I didn't even think such a thing was possible.
It's amazing where they show up this time of year in wet ditches and small creeks, and of course crossing roads.
I read somewhere that an east coast snapping turtle trapper caught his largest turtle (something like 50 lbs) in the pond at Woodstock where all the hippies were swimming naked. Don't know about you but that kind of makes me feel goosey!
Years ago when I was a kid, my dad used to trap them and sell them meat to restaurants. We caught 100’s a year and biggest one we ever got was 42 pounds. It wasn’t the biggest shell diameter wise but it was super thick.
We saw a huge turtle in a local pond about 10 years ago. It was easily 3 ft across. Pretty sure it was a snapper, but we didn’t get a real good look at it.
I got some good sized ones in the swamp; they lay eggs in side of driveway as long as they leave us alone; we do same … used to move them around with gramps 6’ crow bar
This was the 42 pounder. That little shirtless and shoeless kid is me. I’m probably about 8 in that picture so that was a little over 40 years ago.
We see them around here about 15" up to the diameter of a 55 gallon drum pretty regularly. I had turtle soup at a wild game supper years ago...as I recall it tastes a lot like chicken
