A turtle’s shell makes for a great portable home, offering a huge amount of protection to the animal living inside. But this carapace is nothing more than an evolutionary byproduct of another ...

Hans-Dieter Sues - Curator, Paleontology, National Museum of Natural History In a fit of pique, according to one of Aesop's fables, the god Hermes made the animal carry its house forever on its back.

One of the most telltale features of a turtle is its protective shell, and regardless of the species, most turtle shells are discernably similar. Despite what you might see on cartoons, a turtle’s ...

Do turtle shells actually consist of modified ribs? The answer, surprisingly, is yes. This weird-but-true claim went viral in mid-June 2021 when Twitter user and post-doctorate turtle expert Ceri ...

An artistic rendering shows an early proto turtle Eunotosaurus (foreground) burrowing into the banks of a dried-up pond to escape the harsh arid environment present 260 million years ago in South ...

It's a long-held idea that turtles can tuck their heads into their shells when threatened. But is it true? And is this protective trick why turtles the world over have shells today? The answer is that ...

This one-ton turtle once ruled South America’s rivers — until a changing planet proved too much for even the largest ...

Talk about a mutant turtle. Researchers have discovered the largest turtle to ever live, Stupendemys geographicus, roamed the ancient seas in greater ranges than previously believed, according to a ...

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