Where’s Wildlife · Turtle Field Guide
Trachemys scripta scripta
Pronounced (approx.): truh-KEH-mis SKRIP-tuh SKRIP-tuh
A basking pond turtle with a broad yellow marking behind the eye and a yellow lower shell.
Yellow-bellied Slider. Select the photo to browse the gallery. Photographs © Where’s Wildlife.
NATIVE TO NORTH AMERICA
Sizes refer to upper-shell length; age, sex and location affect size.
Broad yellow patch behind the eye
Yellow-striped neck and limbs
Oval shell with yellow markings and a serrated rear edge
Compare views, markings and body shapes in the photographs below.
The broad yellow cheek patch is more useful than belly color alone. The photographed turtle shows this head pattern, yellow neck markings and a slider-shaped shell. Older males may darken and lose much of the obvious pattern.
Red-eared Sliders typically have a red patch behind the eye. Yellow-bellied and Red-eared Sliders are subspecies of the same species, Trachemys scripta, and can intergrade. Unusual or mixed head patterns may need additional views and location information.
Quiet, vegetated ponds and slow waterways with muddy bottoms. Adults feed on aquatic plants and small animals; diet changes with age. Day-active; regularly basks above water.
Sliders forage in water and bask on exposed logs and banks. Females leave the water to bury eggs in soil and can produce several clutches. Younger sliders generally eat more animal food, while adults consume more vegetation.
Yellow-bellied and Red-eared Sliders are forms of the same species.
A broad yellow cheek patch is more diagnostic than a yellow belly.
Sliders regularly climb onto logs and banks to warm in the sun.
Native to the southeastern United States, chiefly the Coastal Plain from southeastern Virginia south to northern Florida and west into eastern Alabama. Released turtles can occur outside this range; a sighting does not establish local native status.
Explore reported sightings on iNaturalist. Observation records are not a complete range map.
Photographs © Where’s Wildlife.