TURTLE OR TORTOISE?
Dear HIW,
I always hear people get confused between turtles and tortoises, as they do look similar. Are they related? Although they look similar, they seem to have very different lives. Jonah Booth
Thank you for your question, Jonah. All tortoises are turtles, but not all turtles are tortoises. This is because the term ‘turtle’ can be used to refer to all species under the order Testudines, or Chelonia. These species are reptiles with bodies in a bony shell. The easiest way to differentiate between turtles and tortoises is to know that tortoises live only on land. However, to add to the confusion, some turtles – such as box turtles and wood turtles – also live on land.