This week I’ve been on holiday and I came across this specimen in a bar in Granada:
Any idea which species this carapace is from?
As ever, you can leave your thoughts, questions and suggestions in the comments box below. Hope you have fun with this one!
Whoever’s been selling these Vietnamese beauties to the Spanish as wall ornaments should be keel-hauled!
Following Chris’s hint — in particular the reference to a maritime torture or punishment — I found a plausible identity: s species with (as often happens) multiple common names: some designating it as a “turtle” and others as a “terrapin,” in both cases further specified by reference to a ship-part. Though the map I found for the species I found suggests it is far from being restricted to Vietnam, being found in much of South and Southeast Asia. … Apparentlyalso sometimes called a “box turtle,” though it does not belong to the same family as American box turtles. (Many different kinds of turtles seem to have had radiations into diverse habitats, with at least some terrestrial members of several families having conversantly evolved high-arched carapaces.)