By Robert Marcos, photojournalist

Like many other older men who set off alone on poorly-planned trips and then vanish, I had left my car at Lake Mead’s South Cove and set off on foot for the area where the Colorado River enters the reservoir. As always, nobody knew where I was or where I was going. I began my hike toward the distant inlet along the shoreline but was quickly stymied. Instead of white fluffy sand the beach was completely covered by sharp and irregular piles of tufa and coral. Although I made it to my destination, I didn’t know that my route could’ve introduced me to any of Lake Mead’s 12 species of amphibians, or 41 species of reptiles – one of which is the Mojave Green Rattlesnake, until some hours later when I stumbled upon the remains of a massive softshell turtle that had died on a sand dune, more than a hundred feet above the lake. Shortly afterward I came across another surprise – broken pieces of Native American pottery that might’ve been made hundreds of years earlier by members of the Hualapai Tribe. The broken pottery made me realize that the sandy plateau that I was standing on existed long before the creation of Lake Mead, and it would still be there long after Lake Mead was gone.

The Texas spiny softshell turtle (Apalone spinifera emoryi) is one of Lake Mead’s most fascinating, non-native aquatic residents, possesses habits that are shaped by its unique anatomy. Lacking the heavy, armored shell of traditional turtles, this species relies on a flat, leathery carapace that grants it remarkable agility both in the water and on land. To survive and hunt in the desert reservoir, the softshell turtle operates primarily as an ambush predator. It spends much of its day completely submerged, buried beneath the sand or mud of the lake floor. From this concealed vantage point, it utilizes its exceptionally long, flexible neck to strike with blinding speed at passing prey, maintaining a strictly carnivorous diet composed of crayfish, small fish, and aquatic insects.¹

Remaining underwater for extended periods requires highly specialized respiratory adaptations. When buried in shallow water, the turtle can easily extend its snorkel-like, tube-shaped nose above the surface to breathe without exposing its body to predators. In deeper zones, it switches to a remarkable process of pharyngeal respiration, effectively absorbing dissolved oxygen directly from the water through its skin and the specialized lining of its throat. This capability allows the turtle to remain hidden on the lake bottom for hours at a time, coming into contact with the open air only when necessary.

Despite their highly aquatic nature, these turtles must still emerge to regulate their body temperature. They can regularly be seen basking during the day on sunny banks, mudflats, and warm rocks, particularly around areas like Rogers Spring. However, because their soft shells offer very little protection against terrestrial predators, they are intensely skittish. At the slightest sign of danger, they abandon their sunbathing and use their webbed feet to sprint back into the water with surprising velocity, diving instantly out of sight.

Regarding the skeleton that I had found, it turned out that a 21-inch long carapace found near the inlet of the Colorado River at Lake Mead pointed to an exceptionally large, mature female spiny softshell turtle, possibly from the Texas subspecies. While male spiny softshell turtles rarely exceed 8 to 9 inches, adult females can reach massive proportions with top shell lengths up to 21 inches. These unique reptiles are shaped like flat, leathery pancakes and possess paddle-like webbed feet alongside an elongated, snorkel-like nose that lets them breathe while remaining completely submerged in riverbed substrate. An individual of this size would have been several decades old, spending its long life as an agile ambush predator that burst from the mud to capture fish, crayfish, and insects.