The Pond Snapping Turtle 2024 Sighting

Each year in the spring (usually May) the large snapping turtle leaves the Crest pond to lay her eggs in a hidden grassy, dirt area within the neighborhood. She typically will lay 20-40 white, ping-pong size eggs and covers them up. She then makes the trek back to the pond to stay, leaving her eggs to hatch, and the hatchlings to find their way to pond in 3-4 months. Bill Miller snapped a picture of her (pun intended) making a long way back to the pond this year in mid-March. It's a much earlier sighting than normal, so we're not sure if she was laying eggs or had some other reason to leave the pond and return.