Road mortality is one of the leading threats to turtle populations in North America. Research published in Conservation Biology found that in the eastern United States, road density and traffic volume are high enough to cause over 10 percent annual mortality in adult and baby turtles — a rate that pushes populations into decline.

A long-term study at Lake Jackson, Florida documented 8,833 turtles killed or attempting to cross a single four-lane highway over 44 months. Under heavy traffic, the probability of a turtle surviving one road crossing was estimated at just 2 percent.

Turtles are also slow to reproduce. Many species don’t reach sexual maturity for 10 to 20 years, and adult survival — not egg production — is what determines whether a population holds steady or declines. Losing adult females on roads has an outsized impact on populations that can take decades to recover.

All of which is to say: stopping for a turtle is worth it.

Why turtles cross roads

Understanding why they’re there helps you respond correctly.

Most turtles you encounter on roads in spring and early summer are females looking for nesting sites. They often travel significant distances from their home wetland to find sandy, sun-exposed soil for laying eggs — and roads, with their warm shoulders and adjacent disturbed ground, can look like ideal habitat. Males also travel during breeding season.

The key thing to know: the turtle has a destination. It crossed from one side for a reason and it is trying to get somewhere specific. This matters for how you move it.

Related article: What to Do If You Find a Baby Turtle

Step one: your safety first

Pull over completely, well away from the turtle. Turn on your hazard lights. Check traffic in both directions before getting out. On a busy road or highway, assess honestly whether intervening is safe — if it isn’t, a single turtle is not worth a serious accident.

How to move a turtle — by type

Small turtles (box turtles, painted turtles, most common species)

Approach slowly and calmly. Turtles often retract into their shells when frightened — this is normal and harmless, just wait a moment.

Pick up the turtle by grasping the shell firmly near the middle, where the top shell (carapace) meets the bottom shell (plastron). Keep the turtle low to the ground in case it startles and you need to set it down quickly. Many turtles will empty their bladder when lifted — normal, not harmful, just be prepared.

Carry it directly across the road in the direction it was already heading and set it down gently on the far side, at least 30 feet from the road edge.

Snapping turtles

Snapping turtles require a different approach. They have long necks that can reach surprisingly far back, powerful jaws, and legitimate reasons to feel threatened. They are not aggressive animals in water, but on land they rely on defense rather than escape — and biting is their defense.

Do not pick up a snapping turtle by the sides of the shell the way you would a box turtle. Do not pick it up by the tail, which can injure the turtle’s spine.

The safest options, per the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission and the Minnesota DNR:

The no-contact method: If traffic allows, stand near the turtle at a safe distance and let it cross on its own. Your presence may deter traffic without requiring you to handle the animal.

The push method: Use a car floor mat, piece of cardboard, shovel, or long stick to gently guide or push the turtle from behind toward the far shoulder. Stay behind and to the side — out of reach of that long neck.

The wheelbarrow method: If you must handle it, grasp the back of the shell near the rear legs with both hands, lift the back end only, and walk it forward. The turtle will either walk on its front legs or slide. The Canadian Wildlife Federation’s freshwater turtle specialist describes this as one of the most reliable hands-on methods.

If you’re grabbing it by hand, stay as far toward the back of the shell as possible and keep your hands clear of the front half entirely.

The single most important rule: always move it forward

Move the turtle to the side of the road it was heading toward — never back to the side it came from.

This is the mistake that causes the most harm. Turtles navigate by instinct toward a destination. If you put a turtle back on the side it came from, it will immediately try to cross again. It may do this repeatedly until it’s hit. The direction of travel isn’t yours to second-guess.

Similarly, do not relocate a turtle to a pond, wetland, or “better habitat” that seems more suitable to you. The Wildlife Center of Virginia is direct about this: turtles have small, specific home territories, and their survival depends on remaining in them. A turtle moved even a short distance to an unfamiliar area will often travel extensively trying to return — crossing more roads in the process.

Move it across. That’s all.

What not to do

Don’t take it home. Wild turtles should not be kept as pets, and in many states it’s illegal. Beyond legality, removing a turtle from its territory disrupts the local population. Turtles are not lost — they know where they are.

Don’t put it in water if you’re unsure of the species. Box turtles are terrestrial. Putting one in a pond is harmful. If you can’t identify the turtle, just move it to the far shoulder in the direction it was traveling.

Don’t pick it up by the tail. This applies to all species. In snapping turtles especially, it can cause spinal injury.

Don’t handle it more than necessary. Even well-intentioned handling is stressful for turtles. The goal is a quick, calm relocation — not an extended interaction.

If the turtle is injured

A turtle with a cracked or broken shell, visible wounds, or that cannot move normally needs wildlife rehabilitation care. Contain it carefully in a box or plastic container with air holes, note exactly where you found it (GPS coordinates if possible), and contact your nearest wildlife rehabilitator or state fish and wildlife agency.

Shell injuries are more survivable than they look — many rehabilitators successfully treat significant shell fractures — but the window for treatment matters. Don’t leave an injured turtle on the roadside or attempt to treat it yourself.

The same care applies as with other injured wildlife: keep it quiet, contained, and away from food and water until a professional can assess it. Our article on what to do if you find an injured squirrel covers the general principles that apply across injured wildlife situations.

Wash your hands

Turtles, like most reptiles, can carry Salmonella. The risk from brief, careful handling is low, but washing your hands thoroughly after any contact is the right practice regardless.

What makes roads dangerous for turtles at a deeper level

It’s worth understanding the scale of the problem, because individual rescues happen in a larger context.

Turtles evolved to survive almost everything except high adult mortality. They live decades, sometimes over a century, and their life history strategy depends on adults surviving long enough to reproduce many times over a lifetime. A species can sustain some nest predation, some juvenile mortality, some bad years. What it cannot sustain is consistent adult loss.

Research from SUNY Syracuse found a striking consequence of road mortality beyond the direct body count: in wetlands surrounded by high road density, turtle populations showed skewed sex ratios with far more males than females. Female turtles are disproportionately killed on roads because they’re the ones nesting — traveling, exposed, purposeful. The females lost to roads are exactly the reproductive adults populations most need to retain.

Every turtle you move across a road is, statistically, probably a female during nesting season. That context makes the two minutes it takes feel more proportionate.

Ways to help beyond roadside rescues

If you encounter turtle crossings regularly in a specific area, a few things are worth knowing:

Reporting sightings — including road mortality — to your state wildlife agency or through citizen science platforms like iNaturalist helps biologists identify high-mortality corridors where mitigation infrastructure (wildlife fencing, culverts, underpasses) can be prioritized. That infrastructure, where it exists, works: a 2025 study in Biological Conservation found that exclusion fencing significantly reduced turtle road mortality at treated sites.

Supporting native plantings near water and rewilding efforts that create suitable nesting habitat away from roads reduces the pressure that drives turtles onto roads in the first place.

Frequently asked questions

Which direction should I move a turtle? Always in the direction it was already traveling. Moving it back to the side it came from will cause it to try crossing again.

Should I move a turtle to a nearby pond? No — unless you can confirm it came from that exact water body. Turtles have specific home territories and translocation, even short distances, reduces their survival.

How do I move a snapping turtle safely? Use a car mat, shovel, or stick to push it from behind. If you must handle it, grasp the rear of the shell only — never the sides or tail, and stay clear of the front half.

What if the turtle is injured? Contain it in a box, note the exact location, and contact a wildlife rehabilitator. Don’t attempt to treat shell injuries yourself and don’t leave it on the roadside.

Why are there so many turtles on roads in spring? Spring and early summer is nesting season. Female turtles travel to find suitable egg-laying sites, which often means crossing roads. June is typically peak road mortality for most North American species.

Is it legal to pick up a wild turtle? Laws vary by state and species. Briefly moving a turtle across a road for its safety is generally not the kind of interaction that regulations target, but taking a turtle home or relocating it is regulated in many states. When in doubt, check with your state fish and wildlife agency.

The post What To Do (And Not Do) If You Find A Turtle In The Road appeared first on Give A Shit About Nature.

Some of those claims hold up well. Others are mostly folklore that’s been repeated so many times it’s taken on the weight of fact.

This article sorts the two. If you’re trying to decide whether borage deserves a spot in your garden — and how to use it well if it does — here’s the honest picture.

What borage actually is

Borage (Borago officinalis) is a fast-growing annual herb native to the Mediterranean, now naturalized across much of Europe and North America. It grows one to three feet tall, with thick bristly stems, large hairy leaves, and clusters of vivid blue star-shaped flowers that bloom from early summer through the first frost.

It’s called starflower for obvious reasons once you see it. It’s also called bee bread and bee bush, which turns out to be the most accurate of its common names.

Borage grows easily from seed, tolerates poor soil and some drought, reseeds prolifically, and asks almost nothing from a gardener. Its flowers and young leaves are edible, tasting distinctly of cucumber with a floral note.

How Borage Helps Pollinators

The case for borage as a pollinator plant is genuinely compelling, and it’s better supported than most of its companion planting reputation.

Borage produces nectar continuously through the growing season, including on cloudy days when many other flowers reduce their output. The Old Farmer’s Almanac notes that borage can yield 200 pounds of honey per acre and 60–160 pounds of pollen — figures that explain why beekeepers historically grew it specifically to boost production.

Honeybees, bumblebees, and many native bee species visit it heavily. The blue pollen is notably nutritious. Because it blooms from early summer through frost, it fills an important gap in the seasonal nectar calendar when other summer flowers have faded.

Beyond bees, borage attracts parasitic braconid wasps, predatory hoverflies, and lacewings — insects that prey on aphids, caterpillars, and other garden pests. This is where its companion planting reputation starts to get interesting, and also where the distinction between what’s proven and what’s observed matters.

Borage As A Strawberry Booster

The most commonly repeated companion planting claim about borage is that it improves strawberry growth and flavor. Most gardening sources attribute this to trace minerals borage supposedly lifts from deep soil, plus the pollinator attraction effect.

The flavor improvement is almost certainly anecdotal and hard to test rigorously. Taste is subjective, and there’s no controlled study confirming that borage changes strawberry flavor chemistry.

The yield improvement, however, has been studied directly. A 2020 paper in the journal Ecological Entomology from the University of Sussex tested companion planting borage alongside strawberries — both in researcher-led experiments and in a citizen science project with 110 home gardeners across the UK. The result: strawberry plants paired with borage produced 32% more yield by weight on average compared to control plants without borage.

The mechanism wasn’t trace minerals or mysterious soil chemistry. It was pollinators. Borage drew significantly more flies and bees to the strawberry flowers, improving pollination rates and therefore fruit set.

This is worth sitting with for a moment. A 32% yield increase, in a controlled study with citizen science replication, from adding one easy-to-grow annual nearby. That’s not folklore. That’s a meaningful practical result.

The lesson: borage probably doesn’t improve strawberry flavor in any measurable chemical way. But it almost certainly improves strawberry yield through better pollination. That’s a real benefit worth planting for.

Borage’s Pest Control Factor

Borage is widely credited with repelling tomato hornworms. This appears in nearly every companion planting source. The honest assessment is that the mechanism is probably indirect, not direct.

There is no controlled study showing borage’s scent repels hornworms. What does have support is that borage attracts parasitic braconid wasps, which parasitize hornworm larvae, and lacewings, which eat caterpillar eggs. The reduction in hornworm damage that gardeners report is likely real — but it’s probably happening because borage is boosting the population of natural hornworm predators in the garden, not because hornworms smell borage and stay away.

This distinction matters practically. Direct repellence would require borage to be planted close to hornworm-targeted plants. Attracting predatory insects works at a broader garden scale — a few borage plants anywhere in the garden may be doing more for hornworm management than borage planted in a careful perimeter around each tomato.

The same logic applies to cabbageworm management. Borage attracts the beneficial insects that control them. It probably helps. But “borage repels cabbageworms” oversimplifies what’s actually a habitat-and-beneficial-insect story.

What borage does for soil

The deep taproot claim — that borage mines calcium and potassium from lower soil layers and makes them available to neighboring plants — is biologically plausible but not well-quantified in garden settings.

What is well-supported: borage leaves and stems are mineral-rich and break down quickly in compost, contributing organic matter and nutrients. Chop-and-drop composting of spent borage plants is a genuinely useful practice in a vegetable garden. The leaves make good mulch around heavy feeders.

In no-dig and permaculture garden systems, borage is valued as a dynamic accumulator — a plant that improves soil biology and structure over time through root activity and organic matter return. The evidence here is more observational than experimental, but it aligns with what’s known about how deep-rooted plants function.

What to plant borage with

Based on evidence rather than gardening lore, the strongest pairings are:

Strawberries. The pollinator attraction effect has actual quantitative support. This is the most evidence-backed companion planting use of borage.

Tomatoes, cucumbers, squash, and other fruiting vegetables. More pollinators means better fruit set. Any crop that depends on insect pollination benefits from having borage nearby.

Brassicas (cabbage, broccoli, kale). The beneficial insect habitat borage creates provides real pest management support, even if “borage repels cabbageworms” overstates the mechanism.

Anywhere in the vegetable garden, honestly. The pollinator and beneficial insect benefits operate at the garden level, not just in immediate adjacency to specific plants.

What to avoid planting next to borage: fennel (allelopathic, suppresses most neighboring plants), and be cautious with compact or shade-sensitive plants, as mature borage can reach three feet and casts some shade.

Growing borage

Borage is one of the easiest plants in the garden. The only real mistake to avoid is starting it indoors and transplanting — it dislikes root disturbance because of its taproot, and transplant shock often produces a weak, stunted plant compared to direct-sown seedlings.

Sow directly in the garden after the last frost, once soil has warmed. Push seeds about 1 cm deep. They typically germinate within a week. Thin to 45–60 cm apart once seedlings are 15 cm tall.

Sun and soil: Full sun is best; partial shade is tolerated. Borage is genuinely unfussy about soil quality — it grows well in poor, lean, even somewhat dry soils. Rich, heavily amended soil produces abundant foliage but fewer flowers, which is the opposite of what you want. Don’t fertilize it heavily.

Maintenance: Almost none. Water until established, then leave it alone. Deadheading spent flowers extends the bloom season. Cutting plants back by half in midsummer can rejuvenate tired plants and produce a fresh flush of flowers.

Self-seeding: Borage drops abundant black seeds that overwinter and germinate the following spring. Most gardeners experience it as a perennial in practice. Volunteers are easy to pull if they come up somewhere inconvenient, and easy to transplant when small (before the taproot establishes deeply).

Eating borage

Both the flowers and young leaves are edible, with a mild cucumber flavor and a light floral note.

Flowers are the most versatile. Pick them in the morning when fresh. Float them in drinks — Pimm’s, gin and tonics, homemade lemonade — or freeze them inside ice cubes for visual effect. Toss them into salads. Candy them with egg white and superfine sugar for cake decoration. The vivid blue holds reasonably well.

Leaves are best when young and small. Mature leaves become bristly enough to be unpleasant raw, but soften when cooked. Use young leaves in salads, or cook older ones like spinach — they work well in soups, frittatas, and stuffed pasta.

Borage tea is made from the leaves: one to three tablespoons of fresh leaves, steeped in boiling water for about 15–20 minutes. Mild cucumber flavor, traditionally used as a tonic. Pliny the Elder claimed it cheered the heart; Roman soldiers reportedly drank borage-infused wine for courage before battle.

One caution: borage contains pyrrolizidine alkaloids, which in high concentrations are associated with liver toxicity. Occasional culinary use in normal quantities is generally considered fine. Pregnant and nursing women are typically advised to avoid it.

Harvesting seeds

If you want to save seed for next year or share with others, allow some flower heads to fully mature and turn brown on the plant. Each spent flower contains four small black seeds. Cut seed heads into a paper bag and dry in a cool, ventilated space. Stored cool and dry, borage seeds remain viable for several years.

Frequently asked questions

Is borage annual or perennial? Annual — it completes its life cycle in one season. In practice, it self-seeds so reliably that most gardeners find it reappears year after year without replanting.

How tall does borage get? Between 30 and 90 cm (one to three feet), with a bushy, branching habit.

What does borage taste like? Mild cucumber with a subtle floral note. The flowers are delicate and slightly sweet; the leaves are more pronounced.

Is borage deer resistant? Yes. The bristly, hairy texture of the leaves makes it unpalatable to deer and most rabbits — a practical advantage in gardens with browsing pressure.

Can you grow borage in a pot? Yes, in a container at least 30 cm (12 inches) deep to accommodate the taproot. It performs better in the ground, and container plants need more frequent watering. For patio pollinator plantings it works alongside lavender, thyme, and other bee-friendly herbs.

When should I plant borage? Direct sow outdoors after the last frost in spring, once soil has warmed. In mild climates, a second sowing in late summer can extend the flowering season into autumn.

Does borage actually repel pests? It probably reduces pest damage, but likely through attracting beneficial predatory insects rather than through direct chemical repellence. The end result for your garden is similar — less damage — but the mechanism matters for where you place it.

The post Borage: Is It Actually Worth Growing? (Here’s What the Evidence Says) appeared first on Give A Shit About Nature.