Narrator: A turtle's shell is as much a part of its body as our rib cage is of ours. In fact, it is their rib cage, and their spine, and their vertebrae, and their sternum. Basically, a turtle's ...

Unique among Earth’s creatures, turtles are the only animals to form a shell on the outside of their bodies through a fusion of modified ribs, vertebrae and shoulder girdle bones. The turtle shell is ...

The fossilized remains of a bizarre-looking reptile are giving scientists new insights into how turtles got their distinctive shells. Some 240 million years ago, this early turtle-like creature lived ...

A photograph of the fossil turtle Eorhynchochelys sinensis, which lived about 228 million years ago and sported a beak but no shell. Nicholas Fraser, National Museums Scotland If a turtle grows a body ...

Travel back in time to 260 million years ago, just before the dawn of the dinosaur era. Journey to what is now South Africa, and make your way to a river bank. Then, wait. If you’re lucky, you might ...

Long, long ago, in a time so far in the past it preceded the dinosaurs and the continents, lived a tiny creature named “grandfather turtle.” It had many of the qualities of the turtles we know and ...

Article by Molly Schafer Photos courtesy of Molly Schafer, Mat Smith, Andy Tocydlowski, Maya Walker, Jim White, Kenneth Geisert and University Archives September 10, 2024 The discovery of a ...

Paleobiologists have discovered exceptional specimens in Venezuela and Colombia of an extinct giant freshwater turtle called Stupendemys. The carapace of this turtle, which is the largest ever known, ...

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.

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