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Reptilia    Testudines    Emydidae  

Ornate Box Turtle
Terrapene ornata (Agassiz, 1857)

SSAR 9th Edition Comments:
 Martin et al. (2013, Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 68: 119–134) found no support for a distinction between subspecies ornata and luteola and recommended their synonymy. Iverson et al. (2017. Pp. 82–91 in Crother (ed.) Herpetological Circulars (43):1-102) cautiously retained both subspecies pending further geographic and molecular study. Turtle Taxonomy Working Group (2021, Chelonian Research Monographs (8): 1–472) synonymized luteola in ornata; however, they state that more complete genetic sampling may revise this decision.

Range maps are based on curated specimens and provided gratis by CNAH.
(Created by Travis W. Taggart; Version: 2023.04.10.13.42.11)
Download GeoJSON polygon range file: - 1.72 MB

Province/State Distribution:
USA: Arizona Arkansas Colorado Illinois Indiana Iowa Kansas Louisiana Missouri Nebraska New Mexico Oklahoma South Dakota Texas Wisconsin Wyoming

First instance(s) of published English names:
Beautiful Emys (Emys ornata: Gray, John E. 1856. Catalogue of shield reptiles in the collection of the British Museum. Part I. Testudinata (Tortoises). Taylor and Francis, London, England. 79pp.); Northern Box Turtle (Cistudo ornata: Jordan, David S. 1878. Manual of the Vertebrates of the Northern United States: Including the District East of the Mississippi River, and North of North Carolina and Tennessee, Exclusive of Marine Species. Second Edition, Revised, and Enlarged. Jansen, McClurg & Company, Chicago. pp.); Painted Box Tortoise (Cistudo ornata: Yarrow, Henry C. 1882. Check list of North American Reptilia and Batrachia with catalogue of specimens in U. S. National Museum. Bulletin of the United States National Museum (24):1-249); Ornate Box-tortoise (Cistuda ornata: Hay, Oliver P. 1892. Batrachians and Reptiles of the State of Indiana. Pages 409-624 in 17th Annual Report of the Indiana Department of Geology and Natural Resources, William B. Burford, Printer and Binder, Indianapolis, Indiana. pp.); Painted Box Tortoise (Terrapene ornata: Brown, Arthur, E. 1902. Report of the Board of Directors. Pages 5-22 in Thirtieth Annual Report of the Board of Directors of the Zoological Society of Philadelphia. Allen, Lane, and Scott, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. pp.); Painted Box Turtle (Terrapene ornata: Hurter, Julius. 1911. Herpetology of Missouri. Transactions of the Academy of Science St. Louis 20(5):59-274); Ornate Box Turtle (Terrapene ornata: Van Denburgh, John. 1922. The Reptiles of Western North America: An Account of the Species Known to Inhabit California and Oregon, Washinton, Idaho, Utah, Nevada, Arizona, British Columbia, Sonora, and Lower California. Volume I. Lizards. California Academy of Sciences, San Francisco. 556pp.); Ornate Box Turtle (Terrapene ornata: Schmidt, Karl P. 1953. A Check List of North American Amphibians and Reptiles. 6th Edition. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, Illinois. 280pp.); Salt Basin Box Turtle (Terrapene ornata luteola: Schmidt, Karl P. 1953. A Check List of North American Amphibians and Reptiles. 6th Edition. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, Illinois. 280pp.); Ornate Box Turtle (Terrapene ornata ornata: Schmidt, Karl P. 1953. A Check List of North American Amphibians and Reptiles. 6th Edition. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, Illinois. 280pp.); Great Plains Box Turtle (Terrapene ornata ornata: Schmidt, Karl P. 1953. A Check List of North American Amphibians and Reptiles. 6th Edition. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, Illinois. 280pp.);

Taxon Links:

  
Catalog of American Amphibians and Reptiles
  
The Reptile Database
  
NatureServe
  
iNaturalist
  
GenBank
  
USGS - Nonindigenous Aquatic Species Database

Selected References:
1857 Agassiz, Louis. Contributions to the Natural History of the United States of America. Volume 1. Little, Brown & Company, Boston, Massachusets. 452pp.
1960 Legler, John M. Natural history of the Ornate Box Turtle, Terrepene ornata ornata Agassiz University of Kansas Publications Museum of Natural History 11(10):527-669
1968 Blaney, Richard M. Hybridization of the box turtles Terrapene carolina and T. ornata in western Louisiana. Proceedings of the Louisiana Academy of Sciences 31:54-57
1969 Milstead, William W. Studies on the evolution of box turtles (genus Terrapene). Bulletin of the Florida State Museum, Biological Sciences 14(1):1-113
1976 Blair, W. Frank. Some aspects of the biology of the Ornate Box Turtle, Terrapene ornata. Southwestern Naturalist 21:89-104
1978 Ward, Joseph P. Terrapene ornata. Catalogue of American Amphibians and Reptiles (217):1-4
1991 Ernst, Carl H. Terrapene. Catalogue of American Amphibians and Reptiles (511):1-6
1996 Minx, Patrick. Phylogenetic relationships among the box turtles, genus Terrapene. Herpetologica 52(4):584-597
2001 Dodd, C. Kenneth, Jr. North American Box Turtles: A Natural History. University of Oklahoma Press, Norman. pp.
2012 Martin, Bradley T. Molecular phylogenetics and phylogeography of the American Box Turtles (Terrapene spp.). Thesis. University of Texas, Tyler, Texas. pp.
2013 Martin, Bradley T., Neil P.Bernstein, Roger D. Birkhead, Jim F.Koukl, Steven M.Mussmann, and John S. Placyk, Jr. Sequence-based molecular phylogenetics and phylogeography ofthe American box turtles (Terrapene spp.) with support from DNA barcoding. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 68(1):119-134
2017 Crother, Brian I. (editor) Scientific and Standard English Names of Amphibians and Reptiles of North America North of Mexico, with Comments Regarding Confidence in Our Understanding. Eighth edition. Herpetological Circulars (43):1-102
2021 Rhodin, Anders G. J., John B. Iverson, Roger Bour, Uwe Fritz, Arthur Georges, H. Bradley Shaffer, and Peter Paul van Dijk. Turtles and tortoises of the world during the rise and global spread of humanity: First checklist and review of extinct pleistocene and holocene chelonians. Chelonian Research Monographs (8):1-472
2021 Martin, Bradley T., Tyler K. Chafin, Marlis R. Douglas, John S. Placyk Jr., Roger D. Birkhead, Chris A. Phillips, and Michael E. Douglas. The choices we make and the impacts they have: Machine learning and species delimitation in North American box turtles (Terrapene spp.) bioRxiv Preprint:46

THE CENTER FOR NORTH AMERICAN HERPETOLOGY — Accessed: Saturday 19 April 2025 22:30 CT