Image of a ‘Snapping turtle’.
Credit: D. Gordon E. Robertson/Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0
A gigantic turtle that was found in a small lake in the Toledo town of Méntrida this weekend turned out to be potentially dangerous .
It was rescued from the water with a large net by members of the Guardia Civil s Seprona unit, assisted by the Madrid Safari team.
The large reptile was spotted by a group of teenagers who were in the area. They immediately alerted the animal rescue services and also shared video footage of the creature to enable them to possibly identify the animal.
It was quickly identified as a snapping turtle
On arrival at the location, the rescue teams quickly verified that the reptile was a snapping turtle , of the Chelydra serpentina species.
He did not have a microchip, something which is mandatory in these species, so they proceeded to install an identification device on him, as reported by 20minutos.es.
As the name implies, the snapping turtle is a potentially dangerous species. A post on social media from Safari Madrid explained: Its aggressiveness and powerful bite are a danger to pets and children, as well as the native fauna of the area .
Once the animal had been rescued, Safari Madrid wanted to raise awareness of the: responsibility of acquiring both domestic and exotic pets, in addition to the danger of releasing them in a habitat that is not theirs, since it is an invasive animal with a high capacity for adaptation .
An alligator was captured in the same province last month
Toledo appears to be a haven for exotic creatures recently. Last month, a huge alligator was rescued by the same teams in the town of Yuclillos.
The animal was discovered swimming in a large irrigation pond on June 8 by the owners of a farm in the municipality. According to La Tribuna de Toledo, the Guardia Civil was notified and Seprona officers were deployed to deal with the reptile.
After its capture, the animal was identified as a four-year-old male that weighed three kilos. It was subsequently examined by veterinarians, who implanted a microchip. He was then relocated to the care of a company based in the Madrid town of Aldea del Fresno.
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Originally from Wales, Chris spent years on the Costa del Sol before moving to the Algarve where he is a web reporter for The Euro Weekly News covering international and Spanish national news.
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