In the colder climate of northwestern Pennsylvania, where I lived for a few years during the early to mid-seventies, I came across eastern spiny soft-shelled turtles (Trionyx spiniferous spiniferous), snapping turtles, and wood turtles with encouraging frequency.

But I have lived three decades in Utah without meeting one single chelonian (turtle or tortoise).  Plenty of snakes—Utah hosts a diverse and thriving snake population.  Lizards, too—lots of ‘em.  But where are the turtles?

A glance at Petersen’s Western Reptiles and Amphibians suggests Utah sightings of the painted turtle, the snapping turtle, and the spiny soft-shell.  Then, of course, there is the small population of desert tortoises, Gopherus agassizii, or Xerobates agassizii, down in the southwest corner of the state in the vicinity of St. George.

Sources suggest that the few painted and snapping turtles found in Utah are introduced, not native  species (released pets).  The soft-shell’s presence in Utah, rare as it appears to be, may exist by virtue of the Colorado River environment as the waterway flows through the southwestern corner of Utah and along the borders of Nevada, California, and Arizona.  The desert tortoise’s Utah range is the northernmost extension of a population found in southeastern California, the southern tip of Nevada, western Arizona, and Sonora, Mexico.   However, as perhaps the most distinguished member of Utah’s chelonian order, the desert tortoise is threatened by drought, by wildfires, by development, by predators, and by upper respiratory tract disease (exascerbated by the release of unhealthy pet tortoises back into the wild).  It may well disappear from Utah.

May I speak openly of the loneliness I feel over Utah’s absence of turtle denizens?  Or will I be laughed from the state by a population with no reason to think of turtles at all, except when through no fault of their own these mild creatures stir up local politics and debates about money?  Despite my decision to live here, Utah’s dearth of turtles thunders like silence in the wilderness interface in my mind—that place in the gray matter where the squirming old brain—the reptilian brain—lies beneath the newer, domesticated, cultivated, subdivided brain we use to watch television.  In that wilderness interface where these two brains trade secrets, there’s a volatile zone where some of us—maybe all of us—recognize origins and old relations.  In this place I feel as plain as hunger or thirst a deep, deep lack of turtles in my life.

This same part of my brain sparks and catches fire when I go to the reptile and amphibian house at a zoo or see a picture of a turtle in a book or on the Internet.  I think: I know this creature.  I’ve started telling people I was raised not by humans but by the wild turtles of the Virginia Piedmont. Maybe it wasn’t true before, but it’s true now; I swear it.

Okay, that’s me—but why should other Utahns care one whit about whether turtles live or die on their turf?

I’ve heard—it’s only a rumor, but a popular one—that Utah, especially along the Wasatch Front, is the con artist capitol of the United States.  Not only do unusual numbers of horse traders and pettifoggers live here but also the good citizens living in these desert valleys provide prime pickings for confidence schemes of all kinds. I mean, it’s said thimbleriggers from all over esteem Utah as happy hunting grounds.

I wouldn’t know—I haven’t seen the numbers.  But I can’t help wondering if the reason for this alleged disproportionate population of predators consuming valued resources rightfully belonging to others might rest in the lack of Turtle People to intercede on behalf of the hard-working but slower-dreaming creatures for whom the great tricksters—Coyote, Jackal, and Anansi—are just too much.

They wouldn’t be for Turtle.  Too bad the ones in Utah are Threatened with a big “T”, are sick, or are genetically isolated because they’re introduced (probably released pets) and so can’t disperse progeny to rescue us from perfidious rascals, and, occasionally, from our perfidious selves.

Notes
1.     Blair E. Witherington and R. Erik Martin, “Understanding, Assessing and Resolving Light Pollution Problems on Sea Turtle Nesting Beaches,” Florida Marine Research Institute, Florida Department of Environmental Protection, FMRI Technical Report TR-2, 1996, p. 1 of section titled “Problems: The Effects of Artificial Lighting on Sea Turtles; www.turtletime.org.
2.     Many sources describe how different kinds of animals and insects orient their migrations by the light of the sun, stars, and moon, and the reflections of all three off other surfaces.  In the case of turtles, Witherington and Martin (see note 3) raise the issue throughout their report, especially in the matter of turtles selecting nesting sites and light pollution’s effect upon turtle hatchlings.
3.     Witherington and Martin, section titled, “Problems: The Effects of Artificial lighting on Sea Turtles, p. 2.
4.     Witherington and Martin, section titled, “Executive Summary,” p.1.
5.     Witherington and Martin, section titled, “Problems: The Effects of Artificial Lighting on Sea Turtles, pp. 3-4.
6.     Ibid, pp. 11-13
7.     Ibid.
8.    Joe Bower, “The Dark Side of Light,” Audubon Magazine (March-April) 2000; magazine.audubon.org/darksideof light.
9.     Ibid.
10.   Ibid.
11.   Ibid.