The Eastern Box Turtle
Thanks for reading my blog. I hope you are having a really good day.
Every kid I've ever met likes turtles. Especially the ones they find in their back yard. But unfortunately, the friendliest turtle around, the Eastern Box Turtle, is found nowhere in the world but the Eastern United States. So lots of kids have never even seen one .
This turtle spends most of its time in the woods, but it likes the water-- especially in the hot part of the summer. Here's the reason I wanted to tell you about the box turtle. It's because of its discipline. By that I mean its ability to forgo instant pleasure because of future risk.
The box turtle's defense against its enemies is to pull back into its shell and stay there until a predator gives up trying to get it out of it's shell. A raccoon will try for as long as two hours to pry open the turtle's shell, so it is important that the turtle stay shut.
But the problem is that it takes a lot of strength to stay closed that long. And it also can only be done if the turtle's stomach isn't too full. If the turtle overeats, the pressure of the closed shell would be too great on its stomach if held too long. It would have to open up to relieve the pressure, and the raccoon could then kill it.
So the turtle has to stop eating before it gets too full, even if it was in the best berry patch it had ever seen. It must stop eating at the right time.
Sometimes it is necessary for you to stop doing something you really want to keep doing, because it's the right thing to do. Like when your mother calls you into the house from playing in the yard. You don't want to have to go in, but it's the right thing to do.
Keep your chin up!
Robert P. Rabbit