Tombstone epitaph., 1915-07-11

those of the snapping turtle are per
 fectly round. They are just about one
 inch in diameter and have a stiff
 parchmentlike shell of creamy white
 or pinkish color. friend tells me
 that he has eaten them as a boy. and
 to the omnivorous appetite of. youth
 they were very we'll favored. Although
 the dawn of motherly affection Is to
 be seen in animals much lower in the
 scale of life than the snapping turtle.
 these latter are entirely devoid of the
 maternal instinct, and after depositing
 their eggs they leave them to be
 matched out by the heat of the sun,
 and take no further interest in them
 whatever
 for observation purposes designated
 Nos. 1, 2 and 3, contained 31. 45 and
 i9 eggs respectively. Another nest,
 No. 1. was found later to contain none
 but infertile eggs.
 The eggs in nest No. 1 were depos-
 others between June 13 and June Is.
 The development of the young is slow. On July 30 the embryos In nest No. l were perfectly formed, but were small | and quite colorless except for the dark eye spots. By August 19 they had as-
 stunned the black coloration peculiar to 1 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 12 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 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 paces about one and a quarter inches 1 long. and quite soft as yet When l their heads were drawn in they looked ! remarkably like large pickied walnuts, They seemed to be ignorant of the "kultur" practiced by their elders and
 made no attempt to bite. A couple of them I 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 23, 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 it seemed evident that they
 intended to spend the winter there. for on September A the young of nest No. 1. matched twelve days before,
 were still buried. As the thermometer | not infrequently goes down to 30 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. Tn July and August I had several times noticed skunk tracks on the beach, and knowing the marauding habits of this animal I felt somewhat l uneasy for my turtle eggs. But at this
 time they escaped. for there was no
 visible mark on the surface of the sand to reveal the position of the nests, and
 before the young emerge the unbroken
 eggs have no smell that could give the 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
 foot Of covering sand. And so on Sep
 tember 25 skunk discovered nest No.
 1 and ate all the young turtles. The
 raider also ate all the infertile eggs of
 nest No. 4. and dug up and destroyed two other nests near by. which l had not known of before.