Natural History of the Ornate Box Turtle, Terrapene ornata ornata AgassizLegler, John M.
Science
Natural History of the Ornate Box Turtle, Terrapene ornata ornata Agassiz
Legler, John M.
Ornate box turtle
The number of recaptures of no individual was great enough to permit
application of refined calculations of size of home range as described
by Odum and Kuenzler (1955). For individuals that were recaptured six
or more times, or individuals for which adequate trailing records were
available, the area enclosed by a line joining the peripheral points
of capture was considered adequately representative of the home range
of that individual, unless recaptures were all within a few feet of
each other or lay in an approximately straight line. If less than six
records of recapture were available, home range was estimated, in the
manner described by Fitch (1958:73), by averaging the distance between
successive points of recapture and letting this average represent the
radius of home range; the actual area of home range was determined by
the formula, [pi](R)², for the area of a circle.
Size of home ranges of males and females did not differ significantly
and data for the two sexes were combined in the final analysis. The
average radius of the home ranges of 44 adults (captured a total of
146 times) was 278 feet (extremes, 71 to 913) when computed by
measuring the distance between successive captures; the average area
of these home ranges was 5.6 acres. Data from 10 turtles that had been
recaptured only once were combined with data from 34 turtles that had
been recaptured more than once when it was found that the average size
of home range in these two groups did not differ significantly. Data
concerning the home ranges of eight of the 44 individuals were
sufficient to permit actual measurement of home ranges with a
planimeter; home ranges of these eight individuals had an average area
of five acres (extremes, 1.2 to 10.2).
A minimum home range could theoretically consist of the smallest area
in which adequate food and shelter were available. Under favorable
conditions a turtle could stay in an area ten to twenty feet in
diameter. Although several such favorable small areas existed on the
Damm Farm, box turtles seldom stayed in one for more than a day or
two. Seemingly, therefore, factors additional to food and shelter
influence size of home range. At the Damm Farm these additional
factors seemed to be: rock fences that acted as physical barriers;
areas that were cultivated, barren, or otherwise unfavorable, acting
as ecological barriers; and, cowpaths and ravines that offered
relatively unobstructed routes along which box turtles tended to move.
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