What does a snapper turtle eat?

They lie on the bottom of whatever water they inhabit and wait for fish to swim by. They have a worm like appendage on their tongues which they wiggle to attract their prey. When the prey swims within reach they attack and catch the prey and eat it. They are extremely fast and powerful. They grow quite large. Some into the 100 + pounds area. They can easily remove a finger or even a hand if you reach out to them. My grandfather caught one on a trot line and when he tried to pull it into the boat it bit a hand sized chunk out of the side of his boat. I could easily imagine that in addition to fish, carrion could be included in their diet A:- I LOVE ANIMALS AND THIS IS THE BEST INFORMATION -that first answer is only the alligator snapping turtle. outher turtles like the common snaping are Florida snapping are any other are ambush predators are sometimes chase after they prey items THEY CAN ONLY EAT UNDER WATER IF YOU KEEP YOUR TURTLE OUT A WATER IT WOULD STARVE TO DEATH THEY CAN ONLY SWALLOW UNDER WATER KEEP THE WATER ABOVE THE TURTLE SO IT CAN SWALLOW.