Painted Turtle for Saturday Critters

While driving along the Branch Road yesterday afternoon we saw a Painted Turtle crossing the road.  It was my first turtle sighting this spring.  Usually I spy turtles resting along pond- side shores or on half submerged logs or in mounds of grasses, however we have had very high waters this spring and many possible resting places have been obscured or covered with high waters.

This turtle we saw yesterday had had enough of too much water and headed out for higher ground.

  When I saw it I immediately got out of our track so that I could get a closeup of it.
Before I could cross the road to follow the turtle I heard a vehicle approaching and I had grave concerns for the turtle's safety.  These  crossings are hazards for these slow moving domed creatures. 

The vehicle passed  and I crossed the road to look down on the turtle and I got a glimpse of its yellow shell underneath and saw the red markings edging its upper shell.

This turtle was quite small but had done well to survive as long as it had.

From the crushed rock under the turtle you can see that it had left the paved area and was now free to continue on its journey.

Painted turtles are very colourful with their red and yellow markings.  the one I had seen yesterday did not allow for much of its markings to show so I shall include a picture from my archives to show more of its identifying markings.  I love the artistry of Painted Turtles and think they are well named!

I am linking today with Eileen's Saturday Critters which can be found at:

http://viewingnaturewitheileen.blogspot.ca/

Have a wonderful day everyone and if you are in Canada enjoy the long weekend.

I usually go for a drive every morning hoping to find some treasure of nature and today I found two painted turtles resting upon a mound which has reappeared in a favourite pond due to shrinking flood waters. Look at the center of the picture below to see the sun basking turtles.

 I have cropped the picture above to better show the two turtles on the mound.