The St. Mary banner., 1915-08-07

fectly round. They are just about one
inch in diameter and have a stiff.
parchmentlike shell of creamy white
or pinkish color. A friend tells me
that he has eaten them as boy, and
to the omnivorous appetite of youth
they were very well favored. Although
the dawn of motherlyi affection is to
be seen in animals much lower in the
scale of life than the swapping turtle,
these latter are entirely devoid of the
maternal instinct, and after depositing
their eggs they leave them to be
hatched out by the heat of the sun,
and take no further interest in them
whatever
Three nests that l examined, and
for observation purposes designated
Nos. 1, 2 and 8, contained 81, As and
49 eggs respectively. Another nest,
No. 4. was found later to contain none
but infertile eggs.
The eggs in nest No. 1 were depos-
tied during the night of June 11-12. the
others between June 13 and June 16.
The development of the young is slow.
On July 80 the embryos in nest No.
were perfectly formed. but were small
and quite colorless except for the dark
eye spots. BY August 19 they had as
sumed the black coloration peculiar to
the immature young, but there was
still a quantity of the yolk of the egg
to be absorbed. On September the
yolk was nearly all gone, and on Sep
tember IL the young were out of the
shells-an incubation period of exact
ly three months. They all, however,
remained buried in the sand. and those
! dug up began to burrow again as
soon as laid them down. They were
thickly smeared with egg matter and
damp sand, but when washed clean
appeared as stout little jet black crea-
lures, with ridged and tubercled cara
long. and quite soft as yet When
their heads were drawn in they looked
remarkably like large picked walnuts
They seemed to be ignorant of the
"Kultur" practiced by their elders and
made no attempt to bite. A couple of
them brought home could not be in
duced to eat anything and persisted in
burying themselves in the damp sand
with which their box was provided.
Nest No. Matched out about Septem-
Der %, but about one-third of the eggs
were infertile.
AS in the case of nest No. 1, the
young made no attempt to leave the
sand, and 1t seemed evident that they
intended to spend the winter there.
for on September "a the young of nest
No 1, hatched twelve days before.
were still buried. As the thermometer
not infrequently goes down to 80 de-
grees below zero here, l was looking
forward with interest to see how the
young turtles would stand the intense
winter cold, for they were certainly
not below the frost line; but at this
point my investigations were arrested.
In July and August l had several
times noticed skunk tracks on the
beach, and knowing the marauding
habits Of this animal l felt somewhat
uneasy for my turtle eggs. But at this
time they escaped, for there was no
visible mark on the surface OF the sand !
70 reveal the position of the nests. and |
before the young emerge the unbroken |
eggs have no smell that could give |
he skunk clue. But when the young |
come out they have strong odor that |
quickly betrays them to the enemy,
even through six inches or one |
DOT Of covering sand. And so on Sep
ember Is skunk discovered nest No.
and ate all the young turtles. The
alder also ate all the infertile eggs Of |
lest No. 4, and dug up and destroyed
wo other nests near by. which / had
lot known OF before.