Common box turtle
Amazing fact
A common box turtle’s upper shell has growth grooves that form nested rings.
University of Michigan Animal Diversity Web
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An illustration based on the real animal.
A little discovery to share.
A common box turtle’s upper shell has growth grooves that form nested rings.
THE REAL WORLD
The real Common box turtle
- Scientific name
- Terrapene carolina
- Japanese name
- カロリナハコガメ
- Group
- Amphibians and reptiles
- Class
- Reptilia
- Order
- Testudines
- Family
- Emydidae
- Genus
- Terrapene
This page covers the species; the eastern box turtle, Terrapene carolina carolina, is one of its subspecies.
How the Common box turtle lives
In hot summers, they are mainly active in the morning and after rain. They eat snails, insects, berries, and fungi. When it gets hot, they hide under rotting logs or leaves, among other places. They dig a shallow hollow in the ground to spend the night.
University of Michigan Animal Diversity WebBasic data
- Range
- United States and Mexico
Where the Common box turtle has been recorded
Records: GBIF.org (CC0 and CC BY 4.0 records, retrieved 2026-11-07). Map: Natural EarthSee the records on GBIF
Watch wild animals from a distance. Do not touch or feed them, and take care of the places where they live.
Names around the world
- 日本語
- カロリナハコガメ
- 简体中文
- 卡罗莱纳箱龟
- 繁體中文
- 卡羅萊納箱龜
- Español
- Tortuga de caja común
- Français
- Tortue boîte
- Deutsch
- Carolina-Dosenschildkröte
- Português (Brasil)
- Tartaruga-de-caixa
- Italiano
- Tartaruga scatola comune
- العربية
- سلحفاة صندوقية شائعا
Names come from Wikidata and iNaturalist records. Where a language has no recorded name, we use the scientific name.
Sources and how we check
- 鳥羽水族館 — トウブハコガメChecked: 2026-11-04
- University of Michigan Animal Diversity Web — Terrapene carolinaChecked: 2026-11-06
We check each fact against its source. The illustrations simplify how the real animal looks.
The classification (class, order, family, genus) follows Wikidata records, checked against GBIF. Classifications can change as research goes on.
The basic data are the values given in each source. They vary with how the animal is measured, whether it is male or female, and whether it lives in the wild or in captivity.
This page was translated from the original Japanese with the help of AI.
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