Baby Painted Turtles appearing

Question
Today is Sunday, May 15, 2011.  Two days ago we found a very small, and we thought perhaps. newly hatched painted turtle on the sidewalk.  Is is possible that this turtle hatched during the winter and stayed underground until the soil temp and air temps warmed up?  We see turtles quite often digging nests in our lawn during the late spring and early summer and do try to protect them from raccoons, fox, etc. but could the eggs or turtles survive winter in northern Wisconsin?
We would appreciate your thoughts.
Thank you.

Answer
Hi Fred,

It's fairly typical in cold weather areas for hatchling turtles to overwinter in their nests (I know box turtles, for example, do this), and apparently very common for painted turtle hatchlings to do so.  Here's some further reading on it that may interest you:  http://www.units.muohio.edu/cryolab/projects/hatchlingturtle.htm  Thanks for doing what you can to protect the native turtles in your area!