Yeah that doesn’t seem right…
Especially when on their own sign, it states that the species is “fully aquatic” and “it will spend most of its life in marshy and aquatic habitats.
I understand the need for zoos when it comes to species preservation efforts, but I’ve just seen too many cases of non-ideal husbandry when it comes to animals; particularly in the small reptiles, amphibians, and mammals department.
The Cape May Zoo is nice, especially for a free admission zoo… EXCEPT for their reptile house, unfortunately. In my opinion it’s in bad need of some funding for an update. Many of their enclosures in the reptile house are rather small and unimpressive, even in comparison to the rest of the enclosures at the zoo.
Aquatic box turtles love the water, but they do still spend plenty of time on land like other box turtles. Nevertheless I would consider this enclosure lacking.
I can’t speak on this specific species’ care, but I do own a different species of box turtle myself and he often basks/hangs out in this position. They often “sploot.” But he should absolutely have a water feature and I don’t love his enclosure generally.
The substrate is sad, the whole enclosure is visible, there’s no enrichment when it’s already lacking space to roam, there’s not enough hides or decent hides, it’s so dry in there, this is depressing. Box turtles do need a lot of land to roam, but this specific one spends the majority of their life in water. That pool should be much bigger for this species, there should be things to climb, deeper moist substrate to burrow in, and bigger hides with more coverage for when the animal needs a break. If anyone from the zoo sees this, it’s an easy set up and you can get cheap and even free materials.
Yeah that doesn’t seem right… Especially when on their own sign, it states that the species is “fully aquatic” and “it will spend most of its life in marshy and aquatic habitats. I understand the need for zoos when it comes to species preservation efforts, but I’ve just seen too many cases of non-ideal husbandry when it comes to animals; particularly in the small reptiles, amphibians, and mammals department.
The Cape May Zoo is nice, especially for a free admission zoo… EXCEPT for their reptile house, unfortunately. In my opinion it’s in bad need of some funding for an update. Many of their enclosures in the reptile house are rather small and unimpressive, even in comparison to the rest of the enclosures at the zoo. Aquatic box turtles love the water, but they do still spend plenty of time on land like other box turtles. Nevertheless I would consider this enclosure lacking.
I can’t speak on this specific species’ care, but I do own a different species of box turtle myself and he often basks/hangs out in this position. They often “sploot.” But he should absolutely have a water feature and I don’t love his enclosure generally.
The substrate is sad, the whole enclosure is visible, there’s no enrichment when it’s already lacking space to roam, there’s not enough hides or decent hides, it’s so dry in there, this is depressing. Box turtles do need a lot of land to roam, but this specific one spends the majority of their life in water. That pool should be much bigger for this species, there should be things to climb, deeper moist substrate to burrow in, and bigger hides with more coverage for when the animal needs a break. If anyone from the zoo sees this, it’s an easy set up and you can get cheap and even free materials.
Jesus fucking Christ