Venous blood gas in free-living eastern box turtles () and effects of physiologic, demographic and environmental factors.

Sustainable wildlife populations depend on healthy individuals, and the approach to determine wellness of individuals is multifaceted. Blood gas analysis serves as a useful adjunctive diagnostic test for health assessment, but it is uncommonly applied to terrestrial reptiles. This study established reference intervals for venous blood gas panels in free-living eastern box turtles (, = 102) from Illinois and Tennessee, and modeled the effects of environmental and physiologic parameters on each blood gas analyte.