No, not a diamondback rattlesnake! A diamondback terrapin–one of the best little turtles in the world. Tame, friendly, lots of personality: well, sure, all turtles are wonderful. But these are kind of hard to get, and that makes them special.
In my turtle tank, as a boy, I had my diamondback (very similar to the one in the video), a painted turtle, a small snapping turtle, and a tiny musk turtle the size of a nickel. I always fed them all by hand, and they liked that.
One night I left their tank outside and it overflowed during an unexpected rainstorm–and all my turtles were gone.
Would you believe it? Every single one of them made its way back. Snappers are pretty good on land, and it took mine two weeks to come home: he must have wandered very far afield. But they all came home. Who would’ve thought it?