Karen Soo Chan, age 7, of Toronto, Ontario, Canada, for her qaestion:

Are turtles different from tortoises?

Some people call them all turtles and some people call them all tortoises. All these animals are very much alike  but there are differences. Some like to spend all their time, or most of their time, on the dry land. As a rule, these fellows are called the tortoises. They have stubby legs and some tortoises have claws on their toes. But none of them can walk very fast.

Turtles prefer to spend most of their time in the water and some of them hardly ever come near the land. The smallish ones spend most of their lives in fresh water streams and ponds. They have legs and feet and some¬times they walk on the land. But the big ocean going turtles have flippers instead of legs. Swimming is easy for them, but walking is very difficult. The male turtles never leave the sea. The females only come on land to lay their eggs.