Cuora amboinensis (Southeast Asian Box Turtle)
The common name of this Freshwater-Turtle in English is commonly called Southeast Asian Box Turtle, Amboina Box Turtle, South Asian Box Turtle and Thai name called เต่าหับ (Dtao Hap).
เต่าหับ : Cuora amboinensis (Daudin, 1801)
Cuora amboinensis is a species of the Southeast Asian Box Turtle Genus (Cuora) within the Freshwater Pond Turtle Family (Geoemydidae), Superfamily Testudinoidea, in the Suborder Cryptodira, in the Turtles Order (Testudines), in the Reptile Class (Reptilia), in the Chordate Phylum (Chordata) in the Animal Kingdom (Animalia).
Subspecies
- Cuora amboinensis amboinensis François Marie Daudin, 1802
- Cuora amboinensis couro August Friedrich Schweigger, 1812
- Cuora amboinensis kamaroma H. J. Rummler & Uwe Fritz, 1991
- Cuora amboinensis lineata William Patrick McCord & Hans-Dieter Philippen, 1998
Geographic Range
Cuora amboinensis occurs throughout Southeast Asia from northeastern India and the hills of eastern Bangladesh through mainland Southeast Asia, but not entering the hill and mountain areas north and east of the Mekong.
It occurs throughout the Southeast Asian archipelago, from the Nicobar Islands through Indonesia to the Moluccas and throughout the Philippines. There is a single record from Timor, but it is possibly introduced there.
The distribution of the subspecies is as follows (Iverson 1992, Rummler and Fritz 1991, McCord and Philippen 1998):
- Cuora a. amboinensis: Moluccas, Sulawesi and the Philippines.
- Cuora a. couro: Sumatra, Java and nearby islands
- Cuora a. kamaroma: Thai-Malay Peninsula, Palawan in the Philippines, and Borneo
- Cuora a. lineata: Myanmar.
The subspecific attribution of Indian subpopulations is unclear; northeastern mainland subpopulations are probably attributable to C. a. lineata.
Its occurrence in China is probably due to trade specimens, or mis-identification. It is farmed in small numbers in China, although this appears to be outside its natural range.
Habitat and Ecology
Cuora amboinensis is largely restricted to standing water bodies, but opportunistically inhabits most types of water bodies except large rivers and reservoirs.
It prefers lowland swampy areas with dense vegetation, but also occurs in intermittent streams in hill forest areas, mangrove creeks, rice paddies and irrigation canals, from tidal areas up to about 400 m altitude (Das 1991, van Dijk 1998, Schoppe and Das 2011).
This species feeds on a wide variety of plant and animal matter; aquatic and terrestrial plants, fruits, molluscs, crustaceans, worms, insect larvae and mushrooms have all been reported in the diet (Schoppe and Das 2011).
Animals may reach nearly 25 cm (Lim and Das 1999), but usually remain smaller (Schoppe and Das 2011).
Maturity has been reported at 13 cm carapace length for males and 15 cm carapace length for females, at six years. Schoppe (pers. obs.) presumes that it takes approx. 4.5–5 years to attain maturity in captivity and at least one more year to reach that stage in the wild (Schoppe and Das 2011).
Females usually produce 1 or 2 clutches of 1–5 eggs per year. (review in Das 1991). A mean of three clutches with two eggs each resulting in a total of six eggs per female per year are laid in captivity by the Palawan subpopulation (Schoppe 2008, 2009).
The mean size of the individuals is reduced as a result of over-exploitation in Indonesia and Malaysia (Schoppe 2008, 2009).
Generation length is estimated at 18 years (age of first reproduction = six years x three). Three generations corresponds to 54 years.
Reproduction
Viable (though not really healthy) hybrids between Mauremys annamensis and Cuora amboinensis kamaroma have been described by FRITZ & MENDAU (2002). Hybrids between Chinemys reevesii and Cuora amboinensis kamaroma have been described by GALGON & FRITZ (2002).
Synonyms
- Testudo fasciata Georg Adolf Suckow (1798)
- Testudo amboinensis Riche in Daudin (1801)
- Testudo melanocephala François Marie Daudin (1801)
- Testudo amboinensis François Marie Daudin (1802)
- Testudo melanocephala François Marie Daudin (1802)
- Cuora amboinensis couro August Friedrich Schweigger (1812)
- Emys cuoro August Friedrich Schweigger (1812)
- Emys amboinensis August Friedrich Schweigger (1812)
- Emys melanocephala August Friedrich Schweigger (1812)
- Emys couro August Friedrich Schweigger (1812)
- Terrapene amboinensis Blasius Merrem (1820)
- Terrapene bicolor Thomas Bell (1825)
- Kinosternon amboinense Thomas Bell (1825)
- Terrapene couro Leopold Fitzinger (1826)
- Cistuda amboinensis John Edward Gray (1830)
- Emys couro John Edward Gray in Edward Griffith (1831)
- Cistudo amboinensis André Marie Constant Duméril & Gabriel Bibron (1835)
- Clemmys (Clemmys) melanocephala Leopold Fitzinger (1835)
- Cistudo amboinensis André Marie Constant Duméril & Gabriel Bibron (1854)
- Cuora amboinensis John Edward Gray (1856)
- Cyclemys amboinensis George Albert Boulenger (1889)
- Cistudo amboinensis George Albert Boulenger (1889)
- Cyclemys amboinensis Robert Mertens (1930)
- Emys cuoro Robert Mertens & Heinz Wermuth (1955)
- Cuora ambionensis Goldsmith, Proctor, Cole & Dadd (1969)
- Cuora amboiensis Wirot Nutaphand (1979)
- Cuora amboinensis kamaroma H. J. Rummler & Uwe Fritz (1991)
- Cuora amboinensis amboinensis H. J. Rummler & Uwe Fritz (1991)
- Cuora amboinensis couro H. J. Rummler & Uwe Fritz (1991)
- Cuora amboinensis cuoro Indraneil Das (1995)
- Cuora amboinensis Ulrich Manthey & Wolfgang Grossmann (1997)
- Cuora amboinensis kamaroma Merel J. Cox (1998)
- Cuora amboinensis lineata William Patrick McCord & Hans-Dieter Philippen (1998)
- Cuora amboinensis kamaroma Tanya Chan-Ard et al. (1999)
- Cuora amboinensis kanzaroma Harald Artner (2003)
- Cuora amboinensis couro Bonggi R. Ibarrondo et al. (2006)
- Cuora amboinensis lineata Nguyen Van Sang et al. (2009)
- Cuora amboinensis amboinensis Nguyen Van Sang et al. (2009)
- Cuora amboinensis kamaroma Nguyen Van Sang et al. (2009)
- Cuora amboinensis couro Nguyen Van Sang et al. (2009)
- Cuora amboinensis amboinensis Rafe Marion Brown (2013)