Pond Slider Moves Up

This Pond Slider is determined to get to the top, and it doesn't care who it has to step on to get there. In this case it's climbing on the back of a Northern Red-bellied Cooter. Though I've seen other species of turtle do this climbing thing, Pond Sliders have some reputation for being aggressive (or at least obnoxious).

There are 2 subspecies of Pond Slider here in New Jersey and it's a little difficult to tell which 1 this is:

  • Usually the Red-eared Slider has a pretty obvious red mark on its ear [1]. This picture is a little inconclusive though, with what I think is a slightly reddish tint blending in with the dark head. 
  • The Yellow-bellied Slider lacks the red "ear", which I initially thought was the case for this turtle. They're also supposed to have wide yellow stripes on the side part of their plastron; this turtle looks to have fairly thin yellow stripes instead.
  • My field guide suggests that there are a small number of Red-eared Sliders without red ears, which is what I'm thinking I've got here.
  • Since Red-eared Sliders and Yellow-bellied Sliders are the same species of turtle, I'm also sure that they can hybridize. Since my understanding is that there are more Red-eared Sliders around here than there are Yellow-bellied Sliders, I'm betting on this being the rare Red-eared Slider without (or barely with) a red ear, though obviously it's safer to identify this individual at the species rather than subspecies level.
  • Neither subspecies of Pond Slider is native to New Jersey. Both were originally a more southern species.
March 29, 2023 at Duke Farms
Photo 270605645, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

[1] More accurately, a red mark on the head where you'd expect an external ear to be.

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