Hi there I'm Jeff Corwin and this is an eastern box turtle. it's actually a part of an incredibly important research conservation study here in Massachusetts. Everybody loves turtles but the truth is turtles are more important when they're left surviving in the wild. They're what we call an indicator species. They tell us how healthy an environment is and they're keystone species they're directly connected in the great web of life. Unfortunately, today especially with turtles like wood turtles, blandings, bogs, and box turtles the populations are crashing and a big contributor to that besides habitat loss is the illegal black market wildlife trade. They're so popular today especially from movies and television shows that people are removing them from the wild and selling them in the illegal black market pet trade. If you take a healthy turtle like this and remove it from the wild it will take 40 years at least to replace that turtle so love turtles but love them in the wild.
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