While taking one of my daily walks at Sawgrass Lake Nature Preserve in St Pete FL (which is conveniently across the street from my house), I happened to see a female Peninsula Cooter (a fairly common species around here) on land a good distance away from any of the local ponds. That is kinda unusual for them, so I crossed the driveway to have a look, and saw that she was engaged in digging a nest. So I sat myself down on a hill about 10 yards away to have lunch and to watch.
For those who don't know, I lived in a converted campervan and traveled around the country, posting photo diaries of places that I visited. But the pandemic has clipped my wings, and I am now holed up in Florida until I can begin traveling again. :)
Alas, she had not picked a particularly good spot for a nest—she was right off one of the main pathways in the park, and she was interrupted several times by people walking by. (Some of them stopped to watch, and some of them never even noticed her and walked right on by.)
After about 20 minutes of digging a bit, then resting, then being interrupted, she apparently gave up and moved off, looking for another spot. Examining the nest after she left, I found that she had already dug three separate chambers and had apparently not liked any of them, as there were no eggs in there. So either the traffic and distractions were too much for her, or the sand here was somehow not to her liking. In any case, she decided to deposit her clutch someplace else.
A couple of photos.