Their habitat includes rivers, estuaries, lagoons, lakes, swamps, and pools. They date back to the dinosaur era and are unlike any other species of freshwater turtle with their feet being flippers, resembling those of marine turtles and the nose looking like that of a pig, having the nostrils at the end of a fleshy snout, hence the common name. They are soft shelled with a leathery textured shell and can absorb oxygen from water through fleshy skin bumps in its throat. They are omnivorous, eating a wide variety of plant and animal matter, including the flowers, fruit and leaves of figs, as well as crabs, mussels and insects. Pig-nosed turtles are completely aquatic leaving the water only to lay their eggs in the soil on the banks. When the offspring are fully developed, they will stay inside the eggs in hibernation until it rains and water levels rise. The young emerge at the same time to ensure maximum survival. Illegal capture for the pet and food trade has seen them drastically decline in Indonesia and Papua New Guinea. Conservationists have regularly seized large numbers from smugglers and released them to the wild.
Quick Facts
Diet
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Colour
Vary from beige , tan, cream to black
Weight
10-15kgs
Lifespan
7-10 in the wild but up to 16 in captivity
Predators
Humans, crocodiles, birds of prey take pups.
Conservation Status
Endangered
Distribution
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Habitat
psum is simply dummy text of the printing and typesetting industry. Lorem Ipsum has been the industry’s standard dummy text ever
Ipsum is simply dummy text of the printing and typesetting industry. Lorem Ipsum has been the industry’s standard dummy text ever since the 1500s, when an unknown printer took a galley of type and scrambled it to make a type specimen book. It has survived not only five centuries, but also the leap into electronic typesetting, remaining essentially unchanged.