Nature Notes: Painted turtles are out from a winter under lake ice

With early ice-outs on some lakes this year, it's time to see active turtles.

Painted turtles are usually first seen sunning a few days before the ice cover leaves larger lakes in various parts of Minnesota. Seeing the first turtle out sunning is a good spring sign for us, but it must be more thrilling for them after having spent the winter under the ice.

The painted turtle, commonly called a mud turtle, is a small turtle with an upper shell up to about 6 inches long and bright orange-red markings on its underside. The painted turtle is the most common of Minnesota's eight turtle species. Ponds and lakes where vegetation is abundant are their preferred habitat. Their diet consists of about two-thirds water plants and one-third animal food, including dead fish, worms and aquatic insects.

Although it isn't easy to get close to the painted turtle, it's probably the least wary of Minnesota turtles. The turtle's habit of sunning on a floating log or any object projecting just above the water level makes it easy to see. My students sometimes asked why turtles bask in the sun with outstretched necks, legs and tails. Reptile biologists said painteds find the sun to raise their body temperatures, enabling their food to digest.

Turtles also receive ultraviolet light to make vitamin A, but there is no certain evidence that sunning removes their parasites.

Jim Gilbert's Nature Notes are heard on WCCO Radio at 7:15 a.m. Sundays. His observations have been part of the Minnesota Weatherguide Environment Calendars since 1977, and he is the author of five books on nature in Minnesota. He taught and worked as a naturalist for 50 years.