European Pond Turtle Emys orbicularis (Testudines, Emydidae) in Kazakhstan: revision of materials on distribution and ecology

The cadastre of records of the European Pond Turtle Emys orbicularis (Linnaues, 1758) in Kazakhstan has been updated. Some old records that had inaccurate geographic locations and/or inaccurate dating have been clarified. New information for the Or’, Ilek, Uil and Emba river basins confirmed the data on the turtle’s habitation here that were almost half a century or a century old. Additional locations of E. orbicularis encounters in the north of the Turgai Table Plain outline the northeastern limits of the species’ distribution in Kazakhstan. The turtle was found on the right tributaries of the Irgiz River, which dry up noticeably in the summer. Single encounters were recorded in the coastal zone of the Kazakhstan sector of the Caspian Sea with water salinity up to 12–13‰. According to scattered data from the 1990–2020s, the occurrence of the pond turtles in Western Kazakhstan varies from 1–3 to 9–10 individuals per kilometer. The breeding season from mating to egg laying takes place from the third decade of April to June inclusive, and the hatching of the young occurs in August. Regulation of river flows, water intake and pollution, grazing, poaching nets, construction of bridges, dams, and roads accompanied by the death of turtles and habitat disturbance, limit the stability of E. orbicularis populations in Kazakhstan.