{"id":160223,"date":"2026-02-18T19:48:12","date_gmt":"2026-02-18T19:48:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/160223\/"},"modified":"2026-02-18T19:48:12","modified_gmt":"2026-02-18T19:48:12","slug":"what-happened-to-tonca-the-giant-turtle-at-mosh","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/160223\/","title":{"rendered":"What happened to Tonca, the giant turtle at MOSH?"},"content":{"rendered":"

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2013 Free local news and info, in your inbox at 6 a.m. M-F. Sign up for the Jacksonville Today newsletter.<\/a><\/p>\n

Q: Tonca, an American alligator snapping turtle, was the unofficial mascot of the Museum of Science & History<\/a> in Jacksonville. He made a memorable impression on many who saw him through the years.<\/p>\n

Tonca was rescued from a pond in Mandarin in 1995 and began living in MOSH\u2019s Hixon Native Plant Courtyard, growing from 50 to 200 pounds. He was often celebrated in the summers with a weigh-in and checkup.<\/p>\n

Longevity is on Tonca\u2019s side. He celebrated his 59th birthday last July at MOSH. But now MOSH is closed, waiting to move to a new building<\/a> across the river, and its Southbank building is planned for demolition<\/a>.<\/p>\n

That leaves many children and their parents curious about what\u2019s become of the massive turtle. Jacksonville Today reader Hannah B. asks:<\/p>\n

\u201cWith the closure of the old MOSH building, what\u2019s happening to Tonca the snapping turtle? Very concerned 10-year olds at a birthday party this weekend need to know.\u201d<\/p>\n

A: We talked with Tyler Holder of High Reason, a marketing communications agency that oversees MOSH communications.<\/p>\n

When the museum closed in September, Holder says, Tonca was moved to the Reptile Preservation Institute<\/a> in Clay County, where he is \u201csafe and sound.\u201d<\/p>\n

The institute\u2019s director, Cody Bartolini helped move Tonca last fall from MOSH to his new habitat in Melrose. Bartolini says Tonca now weighs 210 pounds and has his own 9-foot circular, 3-foot deep pond outdoors.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s basically a boulder at the bottom of the pond,\u201d Bartolini says.<\/p>\n

Tonca lives happily immersed in the 72-degree water, staying by himself because he would eat any other turtles that might share his space. He gets meals of fish and rodents delivered by the staff.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe is well-mannered and not unhappy,\u201d Bartolini says.<\/p>\n

MOSH transferred ownership of Tonca to the Reptile Preservation Institute, and there are no plans for him to return to MOSH.<\/p>\n

Visitors may see Tonca and many other reptiles during tours by appointment. <\/p>\n

Copyright 2026 by WJXT News4JAX – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2013 Free local news and info, in your inbox at 6 a.m. M-F. Sign up for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":160224,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[15584,116,118,117,37042,15585],"class_list":{"0":"post-160223","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jacksonville","8":"tag-askjaxtdy","9":"tag-jacksonville","10":"tag-jacksonville-headlines","11":"tag-jacksonville-news","12":"tag-mosh","13":"tag-together-4-jax"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/160223","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=160223"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/160223\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/160224"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=160223"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=160223"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=160223"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}