Also, the head of a full-grown common snapping turtle is proportionally much smaller than the head of an alligator snapping turtle with the same shell size. Alligator snapping turtles live in southeastern and extreme southern Missouri. Most of their time is spent in the water. Females leave the water only to lay their eggs during June or early July every other year. The record alligator snapper is a 219-pound male captured in southern Georgia many years ago.
Adult males are over twice the weight of females.
A few Missouri specimens weighing more than 120 pounds have been captured. A turtle this big can have an upper shell length of nearly 24 inches. With its mouth wide open, an alligator snapping turtle will remain motionless and wiggle its wormlike tongue when a fish swims by. If the fish tries to grab the worm it is, instead, grabbed by the turtle with a powerful lunge. The alligator snapping turtle is rare in our state due to habitat loss and illegal harvesting.