Herptile Spotlight #8 : Chinese Three-keeled Pond Turtle

Hello guys 🙂

This is my first post in this blog. Mommy thinks that my first post should be like Papoe’s post…an introduction of my species 🙂

The common name for my species is Chinese Three-keeled Pond Turtle…quite long isn’t it? But, I also have other name, which is a bit simpler, that is Reeve’s turtle. I am called Reeve’s Turtle because my scientific name is Chynemis Reevesii (Mommy almost named me Keanu because of my last name 😉 )

How to differentiate my species with others?

I have three strong keels on my carapace, which is usually brown. Our common species (mind you that I am not common!) usually has grey body color with yellowish spots and stripes on our head. Mine is the ALL black one…there is no spots and stripes at all on my body and I don’t even have white part on my eyes. I have black and dark green eyes.

According to chinemys.de, my condition is called Melanism.

Melanism is quite common in older males. They are 6 to 9 years old when the yellow markings are fading and the body color becomes darker. At the end all exterior parts including the iris are completely black. When our male came to us in May 2000 the melanism was already beginning. The yellow markings where still visible and the iris was yellow. By now the turtle is completely black.

My species is quite small, usually 4 -5 inches long (10 – 13 cm)…I am now 8 cm. I think I am already old enough…Mommy didn’t adopt small baby like when she adopted Kame, Kroten and Papoe. However, there are also some cases where my species could grow up to 15 inches. They said that size was found in Japan.

Talking about Japan…let’s move on to where you can find me 😉

My origin is from southern China, through the Yangtze Valley down to Canton, and in Korea, Taiwan and Japan. (..and that’s why I was named Kurome, taken from Kurogame which means black turtle in Japanese). When I think about it, Mommy loves things Japanese, and since I came from Japan maybe I can be her favorite turtle 😉

I am a poor swimmer…mommy had proven that by putting me in Kroten’s tank and all I did was only walking on the bottom of the tank. She took me out and put me back in my tank with shallow water. I tend to be carnivorous when I was small and become omnivorous as I grow older.

Based on what I read on Tortoise.org

They are very curious about what you do in their area, though quite shy. They will peep at you from the cover of a bush. If you ignore them and keep on digging out weeds or planting, they will come right to your side in the hopes of “freebies”. The youngsters in the pond will swim up the incline and stand up on their hind legs and crane their necks to see what you are doing, all the time swinging their front legs to balance. Many a time I have seen them tip too far and flop over on their backs. They are very personable turtles, and tend to make responsive pets.

The site was 100% correct!! I am both shy and curious and often stand on my hind legs with neck stretching to see what Mommy is doing…but when Mommy wants to touch me, I swim away sometimes…I will need time to stop swimming away 😉

That’s all for now guys…Mommy will talk more about my dashing personality soon 😉

I hope you will accept me like you accept Kame (whom I have never met), Kroten and Papoe 🙂

This is how common Reeve’s turtle look like:

Photo belongs to Northrup Photography

This one is from 9gag.com … see how small my species could be 😉 (Edit: Someone told me that this is a stinkpot…not my species)