Little Miss Eastern Painted Turtle

Childhood song...

The Little Turtle
Author: Vachel Lindsay - 1879-1931

There was a little turtle.
He lived in a box.
He swam in a puddle.
He climbed on the rocks.

He snapped at a mosquito.
He snapped at a flea.
He snapped at a minnow.
And he snapped at me.

He caught the mosquito.
He caught the flea.
He caught the minnow.
But he didn't catch me.



I went in search of Herons and came back with photos of a creature carrying it's house upon her back. As I was walking back to the Saab, I spied a small female Chrysemys Picta, the Eastern Painted Turtle in a dangerous location. Don't you love her striped 'turtle neck'? She patiently became another willing subject and in return for her fine posing I carried her across the street, leaving her to find her way down the riverbank. My dad swam in this river in the late '20s and '30s, scrambling up and jumping off riverbank rocks of glacial granite. Always making sure to get out soon enough so his hair would be dry before dashing home for dinner. He told me so many childhood stories of turtle pens and races with his cousins' group of beasts which I just learned is called a 'bale' of turtles. It was a quiet morning on the Indian Head River, which flows to The North River and finally the Atlantic Ocean. Forty years ago I canoed from near our house all the way to the sea, lovely. The Red Winged Blackbirds were singing, iridescent blue dragonflies were jetting across the river surface and turtles were sunning themselves on rocks and old tree branches. A lovely New England June day, a tad too humid for my taste, but teeming with summer life along the river.

Indian Head River

Emerging from the river.

Sweet turtle tail

Lovely color

My painting of my Dad's diving rock on the riverbank.