Happy World Turtle Day

Added: 2026-05-27

[00:00:00]Hi everyone, my name's Alexis. I'm one of the aquatic biologists here at Clearwater Marine Aquarium and today we have the pleasure of celebrating World Turtle Day with a bunch of our red-footed tortoises. We've got 10 red-footed tortoises here. We've got six boys and four girls. They do have two different habitats between all of them.

[00:00:17]They eat a bunch of different things, different mixed greens, so romaine lettuce, bok choy, Swiss chard. They get fruits and vegetables. Fruits seem to be a big fan favorite of theirs, strawberry, mango, banana. They'll eat zucchini and squash and broccoli and you name it, a whole bunch of different things for them. Our big difference between sea turtles and your tortoises is going to be their legs and how they survive and how they walk and swim. Your sea turtles have their flippers that propel them through the waters, whereas your tortoises have more [music] of their feet and claws that are able to dig in ground, walk around perfectly well out in natural terrain environments. Same with your terrapins. If you ever find a turtle out in the wild, you're always going to want to look at their feet and how they would be able to survive. So, if you ever find a turtle, it's always good to set them beside a area of water and that way you're not putting them in the water cuz tortoises would not be able to swim with their heavy shells.

[00:01:07]So, if it is a terrapin, you're giving them the option where they're able to go out into the wild and swim if they so please, [music] but if it happens to be a tortoise, you're still giving them that option to come back up on land and where they naturally survive out. So, again, happy World Turtle Day. Please make sure you're keeping up and educated on any kind of turtle and where they would survive [music] out into their natural environments.