Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Turtles for sale

Just checked out a web site called www.turtlesale.com. They had a baby painted turtle and the price was a mere $249.99. Other species were priced $169.00. They even had redear sliders, though not at those prices. Maybe I should put that 22 up and get out the net. There's money in them there turtles.

Wow ... I've shot about $7,500 worth in the past two weeks alone!

Tell you something I found very interesting. Virtually every turtle that I have shot has ended up as a completely emptied-out shell up on the bank somewhere within not more than 3-4 days. They sure are a canibalistic lot!

heybud,

Not too long ago, there was an advertisement in the Polk County Enterprise(local East Texas paper)...someone was offering to buy the redear sliders for $20 per turtle. I noticed the ad disappeared after a couple of editions never to be seen again...I suspect the old supply and demand equation kicked in and the buyer was overwhelmed with sliders.

WOW did you see what they wanted for a snapping turtle!? I trapped a few turtles this spring that made his 20 pound turtle look like a juvenile delinquent! When I was home last I set a fike net in a pond for a farmer and had 75 turtles in two days, snappers, sliders, terrapins, teal pots,, I removed a few grand in turtles according to this guys web page!

There is a guy at Spirit Lake, Iowa that buys and buchers turtles, mainly snapping and spinney softshell turtles. He has 6 people working full time just buchering. They go through thousands and thousands of turtles a year. These turtles are destined for oriental customers. I asked him if he sees many very large individuals. He said that they are extremely rare because trapping has remove the large ones long ago.

This is not based on facts, just my thoughts on the subject...I am thinking that turtles could be considered wild game, and in the state of Indiana, wild game belongs to the people of the state. It is illegal to sell wild game. I've mostly seen this applied to deer, and a local butcher shop got in trouble a few years back for selling deer sausage.

I always thought that fish and animals fell into 2 separate categories. You can fish in your private pond without a license because those fish belong to you. You can't fish in a public lake without a license becase those fish belong to the state.

You can't hunt, even on private property, without a license because those animals roam from place to place and were not put there by you.

It seems to me that turtles would fall into the licensed arena and be illegal to sell.

Shawn,

It depends. Each state is different and each state allows the sale of one thing and not the other. Many times you can do so if you have a license or permit. Not sure about turtles in Indiana but here is a link to find out:

http://www.in.gov/legislative/iac/T03120/A00090.PDF

You'll have to scroll down quite a ways to find what you need.

An easier way would be for a person to contact their local law enforement officer. I do some reptiles are protected in Indiana even though they are for sale in other states.

Heybud do you think it might work if I ran an ad in the paper reading "free turtles all you can carry you pick um."

Probably work in Louisana. (Just kidding you cajuns)