A Chinese Canadian man has been caught at the US-Canada border with 41 live turtles taped to his legs and 10 hidden between his legs in an attempt to smuggle the reptiles out of America.

Having been detained for a year, Xu Kai, 27, pleaded guilty to six smuggling charges on Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Ann Arbor, Michigan. He confessed that he ordered the turtles online and travelling to the U.S. to pick them up before returning to Canada and shipping them to China.

Xu Kai admitted to smuggling or trying to smuggle more than 1,600 turtles of different species out of the United States from April 2014 until his arrest in September 2014. Among the turtles he smuggled, there are several rare species such as eastern box turtle, red-eared turtles and diamondback terrapin turtle. Some species of turtle could be sold at a price of 800 U.S. dollars on market.

He faces a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison. It is illegal to export wildlife from the United States without proper authorization from the government.