101823

During the summer of drought, my best friend Darrell and I walked down the creek that ran westward from our house through the woods. Instead of its usual 6 to 10 inch width and two or three inch depth, the creek was just a series of puddles in sand, in between the small boulders that normally formed miniature Islands. We turned over all the stones that were big enough for us to move, looking for salamanders. We didn't find any of those, but we found seven box turtles that were probably looking for drinking water. Seven was all we could carry between us, so we headed back to my house. Somewhere I think I still have the photodocumentation of our booty, shot with my brownie camera by the front porch. Box turtles don't make good pets; they often refuse to eat, so we turned them loose. Looking back on the whole adventure, we should have returned them to the creek. I sure hope they found water before it was too late!