box turtle hatchling

box turtle hatchling at Mariton Wildlife Sanctuary

By Zane Miller, preserve manager, Mariton Wildlife Sanctuary

Today I witnessed a box turtle hatchling emerge from a nest that I had protected back on July 7th!

I had stumbled upon (not literally, fortunately!) a turtle laying eggs in the middle of a trail at Mariton and, knowing that nest predation is one of the mortality factors driving box turtle declines, I decided to try to protect the nest.

I’m glad I decided to try to protect this nest because my encounter with her led her to abandon the nest without completely covering the eggs, which I discovered when I returned to the site. So, I covered the eggs with some of the soil she had excavated and built a small cage structure with escape holes that I staked to the ground. Then… I waited, hoping the hatchlings would survive.

Well today (October 9, 2026) was the day! I’ve been checking the nest several times a week for the past month knowing that incubation times range from two to three months and today was 13 weeks and 3 days since she had laid the eggs.

You can see the caruncle (egg tooth) at the tip of its “snoot” if you look close enough in the photos. Turtles use this tooth–a horny, hardened thickening of the skin or a modified scale made of keratin–to break through their eggs.

This little turtle still has a long way to go, but at least I gave it a fighting chance!