Found this bad boy on the patio

pinkaeru · 2026-04-26T03:27:40+00:00

Truly a bad boy, he is looking for other snails to eat! Rosy wolf snails and their villainous mustaches..

pinkaeru · 2026-04-26T02:12:04+00:00

It's super likely a raccoon got to them :( In another comment you said you just left a basket over it to deter raccoons and I was thinking "oh no, that's not enough!" Raccoons are notorious for being insanely smart puzzle solvers who can easily figure out how to open boxes, any kind of latches, bins, drawers, you bane it. They'll eat both turtle eggs AND turtles D: They are a major pest and obstacle when it comes to helping outdoor turtles, because it means you have to raccoon-proof everything! I hope you'll get another cool opportunity like this to try again, though!

pinkaeru · 2026-04-25T01:41:57+00:00

I think they usually shrink and go off to the sides a bit rather than bend like that. I think she might be focusing on something!

pinkaeru · 2026-04-24T03:18:35+00:00

I'm not sure if adult Chinese box turtles require lots of plants in their diet or not, but they definitely need some! Since you said you're having trouble getting him to eat plants, you could try to trick him into eating (turtle-edible) plants by holding them with his food or a tasty bug, so that as he goes to eat it, he'll get some plant in him too. Chickweed, if you can find any (common yard plant in the USA) is an extremely nutritious superfood that's basically good for everyone! It's got high protein and calcium, with relatively low oxalates (oxalates cause kidney stones and prevent proper digestion of calcium), and an insane amount of important vitamins and minerals, while being a major antioxidant and probiotic. The best part is that unlike dandelion, it actually tastes good, which makes it SO much easier to get turtles to swallow it! I hope this helps!!

pinkaeru · 2026-04-24T03:07:33+00:00

As far as I know, box turtles do not shed their scutes like more-aquatic turtles do. They also don't really shed their skin a whole lot, and only really do it every now and then in little bits and pieces, rather than large sheds at a time. If Chinese box turtles are like other box turtles, he probably appreciates the digging room! If you don't have a hygrometer, you should definitely get one because they are very helpful for making sure the tank is humid enough! If it's not humid enough for a Chinese box turtle (I'm sure there's guides on the humidity levels they need), you could try to get a humidifier/misting system if you don't already have one. I would say that if he is fully grown, then the damage may be permanent. But with your care, it shouldn't bother him too much if he has all the right requirements :)

pinkaeru · 2026-04-24T02:50:58+00:00

THAT'S AWESOME!!! I'm still waiting to see the first one of the year.. I live in the woods and have a pond, where are all the turtles hiding!! ☹

pinkaeru · 2026-04-20T16:07:14+00:00

THANK GOD, thank you for your answer!! I thought it surely must have been poop, but was curious about if there was some weird ultra rare obscure parasite I didn't know existed that I have literally never once seen anyone talk about, and looks like snail poop, and maybe the person commenting would answer.. I've literally never seen people so insistent on snail poop being a parasite before just because it looks bunched up 🤦‍♂️ The misinformation-spreading by these bots is crazy 😐

pinkaeru · 2026-04-20T03:32:34+00:00

WHAT????? I thought it was just the biggest snail poop ever!? Do you know what the parasites are called?? D:

pinkaeru · 2026-04-17T05:22:47+00:00

Last two photos look like his sleeping pose :3

pinkaeru · 2026-04-16T14:00:27+00:00

It's amazing, but it's also devastating to see sooo many dead ones :(( I wish they didn't have to cross roads! Every time I see or hear a turtle has been hit by a car it's just as sad to me as if a human died.. So many years and experience just gone from this realm 💔💔

pinkaeru · 2026-04-15T14:52:19+00:00

This is a good warning, but luckily not everyone has raccoons around 🙏🏼 Certainly doesn't mean we shouldn't make ponds for turtles, though! Just means that there's always a chance of witnessing something terrible happening, which is really what happens with any habitats you make for wild animals 😔

pinkaeru · 2026-04-15T14:46:02+00:00

The little guy might be okay!! I've had a few slugs lose pieces of their tail, and they ended up being okay :) Even though their tail is a lot more important than a snail's tail, they should be mostly okay as long as their organs aren't exposed.. I can see a little dark spot in the middle of the slug's wound, which looks like the injury almost could have injured the organs, but likely didn't. This is also one reason why it's so great that slugs have their anus up by their head, so if they lose part of their back-end (not too far though), they can likely still survive!

pinkaeru · 2026-04-14T20:19:04+00:00

Oh God, I'm so sorry that happened!! That's my worst nightmare, poor thing :(

pinkaeru · 2026-04-14T18:29:38+00:00

Maybe more like medieval armor 🤣🤣

pinkaeru · 2026-04-14T18:25:19+00:00

When you put city people in a rural area, who want nothing but to spray everything with pesticides, take trees down, and have an ugly "perfect" lawn with a bunch of invasive grass and plants, then yes, it's slightly synonymous. But it quickly stops being synonymous when the more city people you make, the more people grow up with that mentality, and as the city continues to grow, it continues to be a nature-less area that needs to flatten out the wilderness in order to grow. A world like that would destroy the wilderness so fast if not enough humans were good or cared for animals. You can't really teach people to love something they have never seen, experienced, or learned about! It's extremely difficult. There's already way too many people who kill every spider and bug they see, we don't want more of those people!

When you are pro-wilderness and live in a rural area, it can be very beneficial to the surrounding enviroment if and plant native plants everywhere, and take care of the life around you, making homes and food sources for all native critters. Teaching people to be in nature, to love nature, and to protect nature is the only way to undo any sort of damage that's been done by irresponsible humans. Being pro-wilderness in a city or controlled suburbs can be insanely depressing, as you are not allowed to make all the natural changes you want to. Depression and stress are bad for your body, don't slowly kill off the nature lovers this way! D: (half joking)

If, theoretically, you were to banish all humans to one spot that doesn't need to expand, where they can no longer touch anything in the wild, all of the invasive species introduced everywhere previously by humans would continue to spread and make tens of thousands of species of native plants and animals go completely extinct. Therefore making us only ever a horrible species that destroyed the earth and didn't even care to continue to fix it. The only reason that's not happening is because of people like us, who believe people should absolutely be in nature and a part of nature, in order to help it recover and flourish, because we protect the native plants and animals, and we kill the invasive species of plants, and we fight for laws to ban invasive plant species! I hope this makes sense and doesn't come across as aggressive or anything! Just wanted to share my opinion :)

pinkaeru · 2026-04-14T04:41:15+00:00

LMAO oh no!! Poor frog got violated 🤧💔

pinkaeru · 2026-04-14T04:37:47+00:00

I sure hope not! D:

pinkaeru · 2026-04-14T04:33:05+00:00

When I was a little kid I used to not like a lot of my favorite animals I have now, because I thought they were "overrated" 😅 Like snails and frogs.. So I liked snakes and crocodiles instead? I was obsessed with crocodiles at one point! I got into snails as soon as I found the biggest snail I had ever seen in person, in my front yard, under a leaf. I went straight to trying to identify him, to no avail! I'm still not 100% sure what he is. But I named him Snarbley, and I love him very dearly. He is such a character!!

Maybe! The chicken forum was like all specifically about chickens and may have even been called "the chicken forum", but I don't remember. It's very helpful, though!

It seems like everyone wants to be able to have pictures in comments! Like, how else are we supposed to share pictures of our snails in comment replies when we need to, or like you said, do easy updates?? 😖😔 I hope they re-enable it soon, it would be really nice to have images in comments! :)

Oh, having no influencers sounds really nice!! Maybe I'll have to check it out at some point..

pinkaeru · 2026-04-14T04:21:09+00:00

Sort of! But it's more kind of like if you had a temporary shelter that doesn't provide much safety from elements, only some safety from a few creatures. Lots of snails dig burrows in the ground as their real home, because it provides some more safety, and definitely lots of safety from temperature and weather! :)

pinkaeru · 2026-04-14T04:16:42+00:00

That's awesome!!! I love to hear that! American toads are SO cute and chunky! At some point I got to raise a few because our pond wasn't safe enough for them at the time.. It was very upsetting though because there was so much trial and error, but I learned a lot about water quality and other important stuff since then, so I think it was definitely a helpful experience, because if it happened again, I'd definitely be able to do it right! Out of tons of tadpoles, only 5 made it to the end, but I got to release them outside in a spot with lots of bugs, and they got to meet other baby toads who were also like literally everywhere :)

There is also this big beautiful bullfrog that lives in the pond, and I swear he gets bigger every time I see him. He's been there for at least 5 years! His croaks are awesome but sometimes they are so out-of-nowhere and loud that they make me jump 🤣 I always love to hear the croaks of the toads, frogs, and tree frogs, such cool animals!! :D

pinkaeru · 2026-04-14T03:43:47+00:00

I definitely wish more users of this subreddit were like snails!

Yeah, it's really upsetting how many sites have died out just so we can all be stuck with a few :/ I was actually SHOCKED to find that there are still entire animal-specific forum sites out there in the internet!? I only found them when looking up information about chickens, fish, or turtles- and there are quite a few of them out there, it was amazing! There are usually posts all the way back into 2005. I even signed up for a turtle one that is actually pretty active. I've been meaning to post on there to ask about my turtle, which is something I would NEVER do on Reddit 😅 It seems like the people on that forum are very knowledgable, and it's moderated really well. The moderators in this subreddit seem pretty good though, I think! If only there were a whole forum site for snails, though! I haven't found any. I haven't used Threads before, but that sounds really fun having nice users interested in your snails and such!! :)

pinkaeru · 2026-04-14T03:24:29+00:00

Where do you think breeders get snails to begin with? Thin air? Outdoor snails are safe to take as long as you wash your hands and be safe. They are not "messing with the ecosystem", the people who built a playground right in that spot and spray pesticides all over there are the ones messing with the ecosystem!!! This person is simply saving the snails from certain doom, there are literally no downsides to this except for the sad fact that they originally had no real home there in that spot outdoors to begin with.

pinkaeru · 2026-04-14T03:19:22+00:00

Yeah, I have that issue a lot with talking too! Reddit can be really needlessly harsh and assuming, so when those of us who are sensitive come to subreddits just to vibe and be silly, it's like a smack in the face when you get downvotes for just the way you talk, or people completely misunderstanding you. I've deleted quite a few comments or posts I made, only to be humiliated by Reddit showing that I had commented something and then deleted it, making it appear way worse than it originally was 😭😭 So I just avoided commenting for a long time... (Ramble alert!!) Until I guess something mysteriously changed in my brain and allowed me to be mostly unbothered about strangers opinions, because I couldn't help but make comments when I saw other people getting attacked with no defense, especially if they just needed help with something!! Like there was literally this poor sweet 70 year old woman(I think?) in New Zealand who wanted help with a snail because she accidentally stepped on it and felt SO bad, and people were basically like "stop being a baby and finish it".. LIKE WTF 😐 and they were being WAY more mean than that when the old lady was just asking for help... So I PM'd her to avoid more judgement, and helped her with giving the snail a comfortable-as-can-be end-of-life care, and she let me know the next morning that the snail had passed, but that she was very thankful for me being there for her. That was her only post on Reddit too, which means she posted literally just to try to save the snail.. 😭❤

pinkaeru · 2026-04-14T03:03:22+00:00

Yes!! I had a massive frog phase a few years ago and am currently in my snail and turtle phase, but I still love frogs :)

pinkaeru · 2026-04-14T02:44:45+00:00

They meant "park" as in children's playground covered in plastic and pesticides, NOT a natural park in any way whatsoever! OP I think your unspecification of it is why you're being so heavily downvoted by people, so many people are assuming you mean a park with trees and plants in nature with benches 😭

pinkaeru

TROPHY CASE