Reptiles
Alligator Snapping Turtle
Macrochelys temminckii · also called alligator snapping turtle, loggerhead snapper
The alligator snapping turtle looks like a dinosaur that missed the memo about extinction — a spike-shelled, hook-jawed, moss-covered slab of a turtle that can outweigh a person and hunts by turning its own mouth into a fishing rod.
Overview
Alligator snapping turtles live in the rivers, backwaters, oxbow lakes, and swamps of the southeastern United States, in waters that eventually drain to the Gulf of Mexico. They are almost entirely aquatic, leaving the water only for females to nest, and they favour deep, slow water with plenty of submerged cover — logjams, undercut banks, root masses. An adult may spend most of its life within a short stretch of one river.
Fishing with a lure
The turtle’s signature behaviour is luring. It rests on the bottom with its jaws gaping, holding utterly still, and wriggles a small pink, worm-shaped appendage on its tongue. A curious fish swims in to take the “worm” and is engulfed in a snap. Algae growing on the rough, ridged shell completes a disguise that makes a stationary alligator snapper look like a weedy rock. Big adults do less luring and more ambushing and scavenging, and the diet is broad: fish, crayfish, clams, other turtles, snakes, birds, small mammals, and carrion.
The bite
The alligator snapper has one of the most powerful bites of any turtle, several times that of the common snapping turtle, and the hooked beak can shear through bone. It is not aggressive in the water, but a captured or cornered animal on land will bite hard, and it should never be handled.
Slow lives
Females mature at 11 to 13 years and lay one clutch a year. Combined with a lifespan of well over half a century, this makes the species exceptionally slow to replace losses — the central problem for its conservation.
Status
The alligator snapping turtle is Vulnerable and declining. Decades of largely unregulated harvest for meat, much of it for turtle soup, hollowed out populations across its range, and illegal collection, fishing-gear drowning, dams, and pollution continue to press on it. It is now legally protected in most US states where it occurs, and is a candidate for federal protection.
Alligator Snapping Turtle: common questions
How is the alligator snapping turtle different from the common snapping turtle?
They are different genera and quite distinct. The alligator snapper is far bigger — up to 100+ kilograms against a common snapper's 15 — with a huge head, a strongly hooked beak, three prominent jagged ridges running down its shell, eyes set on the sides of the head, and the unique tongue lure. It is a sit-and-wait ambush hunter that barely moves. The common snapping turtle is smaller, smoother-shelled, has eyes near the top of its head, actively forages over a wide area, eats a lot of plants, and has no lure. The alligator snapper also has one of the strongest bites of any turtle; the common snapper does not.
How does the tongue lure work?
On the floor of the alligator snapper's mouth is a small, fleshy, forked appendage that is pinkish-grey normally but fills with blood to a bright worm-pink when the turtle wants to fish. The turtle settles on the bottom, opens its jaws wide, holds completely still, and twitches the lure so it writhes like a worm. A fish that swims in to investigate is engulfed as the jaws snap shut, often faster than the eye can follow. Larger turtles rely less on the lure and more on simply ambushing or scavenging.
Is it dangerous to people?
A large alligator snapping turtle can absolutely cause a serious injury — its bite can crush or sever fingers and has been measured at several times the force of a common snapper's — and it should never be handled or provoked. But it is not aggressive toward people in the water. It is slow, retiring, and reliant on camouflage; bites happen almost exclusively when someone grabs one, stands on one, or tries to move one that has been caught on a fishing line. In the water it will simply stay still or withdraw.
Why is the species Vulnerable?
For most of the 20th century alligator snapping turtles were harvested heavily and largely unregulated for their meat, much of it going into canned turtle soup, and populations across many rivers were badly depleted. Because females take over a decade to mature and produce just one clutch a year, recovery is extremely slow. Continuing pressures include illegal collection for meat and the pet trade, drowning in fishing gear and on trotlines, habitat alteration from dams and channelisation, and river pollution. Most states now give the turtle legal protection.