Turtles spend time in water and land. Tortuses land only

From the Tortoise Trust Guide to Tortoises & Turtles.

What’s the difference between a tortoise and a turtle?

Strictly semantics. All are chelonians. All chelonians are turtles. There is indeed a regional variance in the naming of chelonians. With the advent of modern communications this regional variation is becoming blurred.

In the USA – a turtle is found in or around water and a tortoise is found on dry land. A terrapin is a turtle that is found in brackish water. In general, look at the back legs. If they are webbed, call it a turtle. If they are stumpy (like an elephants) call it a tortoise.

In the UK they apply terrapin to freshwater chelonians, tortoise to land chelonians, and turtle to oceanic dwellers.

In Australia ‘tortoise’ is used for everything except sea ‘turtles’. (There are no land chelonians native to Australia)

Terrapin is also occasionally used as the name for any turtle that is to be eaten by humans in both the UK and USA.

A turtle can move fairly fast if need be, especially into the water if danger approaches.

A tortoise has a boxy looking shell; its shell is more rounded, and is much more obviously segmented.

A tortoise is more likely to be found in dry places including deserts and dry empty fields.

A tortoise moves slowly most of its life.

Tortoise— A land-dweller that eats low-growing shrubs, grasses, and even cactus. Tortoises do not have webbed feet. Their feet are round and stumpy for walking on land. Tortoises that live in hot, dry habitats use their strong legs to dig burrows. Then, when it’s too hot in the sun, they slip underground.

For most Americans, the term ‘turtle’ describes the Chelonians that are aquatic or semi-aquatic. The term ‘tortoise’ describes a Chelonian that lives primarily on land. ‘Terrapin’ can describe some freshwater or saltwater turtles, but is not often used.

If you were in Australia, you might call all of the turtles ‘tortoises,’ and in Britain, a ‘turtle’ would mean a saltwater species and a ‘terrapin’ would be a freshwater species. Are you confused yet? Good, so am I. So for the purpose of this article, let us call the species that live on land, tortoises and the species that are aquatic or partially aquatic, turtles. We will forget about the term terrapin for now.

While there can be a lot of differences between individual species, for the ease of comparison, I am going to go out on a limb and make a couple of general assumptions about the difference between turtles and tortoises. In general, tortoises live on land and eat a primarily vegetarian diet, and turtles live in or near the water and eat a meat-based diet or a combination of meat and vegetation. To take this one step further, turtles are often broken down into aquatic and semi-aquatic species. The aquatic species spend the majority of their lives in or near the water and eat a diet that is mostly meat based. Semi-aquatic turtles spend a greater period of time on land, but periodically enter the water. Semi-aquatic turtles tend to eat both plants and animals. An example of a semi-aquatic turtle is the well known American Box Turtle. While there are several subspecies differences, this turtle tends to spend most of its time on land, but enters very shallow water several times a week to defecate. The young turtles are primarily meat eaters, but as they get older, they eat a primarily vegetarian diet.

Turtles usually live in salt water and have large blade shaped flippers for swimming. They find it very hard to walk on land.

Tortoises usually live on land or in fresh water. They have legs rather than flippers and can walk quiet well on land.

If this or another answer here proves helpful in your research, you can encourage good answers by choosing one answer as the “best answer.”

Cheers,

Bruce