So … this is what I did today. 😀 (I’m one of the SSU herpetologists). The link goes to a National Geographic article about the project we’re doing in collaboration with the Oakland and San Francisco zoos.
By Jordan Carlton Schaul of University of Alaska; Grizzly People on August 17, 2012
National Geographic Archives
Read the entire article here: http://voices.nationalgeographic.com/2012/08/17/bay-area-zoos-sonoma-state-university-to-release-western-pond-turtles/
Turtle #201, aka Neville (they asked me to give him a name when he needed to have surgery; apparently, they like to make things more personal like that at the zoo). This is just a teaser … I’ll post more photos of the baby turtle release once I get them off my camera; this photo was taken by someone else. (Haha, obviously). But yeah … ME AND MY BB! Who is now swimming happily in the lake where his mama lives. I didn’t actually cry when I released him, but I came close. <3 <3 <3
Here is the poster I presented at the 7th World Congress of Herpetology in Vancouver, British Columbia, August 8 – 14, 2012.
An article featuring our lab’s work with Western Pond Turtles.
Photo: Stephen Lam, Special To The Chronicle
Read the entire article here: http://www.sfgate.com/default/article/Oakland-Zoo-to-release-turtles-to-wild-3777354.php#photo-3309244
So, this is my favorite turtle! He doesn’t even have a name – he’s just #201. (Well, now he’s actually #801, because of the way we number the babies, but he’ll always be 201 in my heart). He was the tiniest turtle incubated and hatched in our lab for the 2011 season: only 3.32 grams at hatching. So tiny and precious.
He’s nine months old now, and for the first time ever I can actually refer to him by his correct sex. (Most of the baby turtles are female, so I always call them all “she” until proven otherwise). But 201 turned out to be A BOY! Hahaha! I’ve just realized I can even post a picture of his internal boy parts; that’s the very last photo – taken through the endoscope of his gonads. (I hope he won’t be embarrassed by that). Here’s a time series to see how he grew over the past nine months:
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Female western pond turtles (Emys marmorata): their nesting season has begun at my field site in Lake County, Calfornia. The turtle in the first photo (#222, a recapture we first encountered in 2010) nested on June 6th – and yes, that photo was taken while she was in the process of laying her eggs. And the gorgeous girl in the other photos (#225, also first captured in 2010) nested on June 7th. The turtles seem to be coming out in greater numbers about a week earlier than they did last year.
The lab at my university has been studying this population of turtles for five years now (this is my third year on the project). We’re looking at nesting behavior, including the ways in which they use the habitat – distance from tree line, or distance from the pond, and whether or not the females return to the same spot year after year to nest. We’re also looking at temperature profiles inside of the nests, because these turtles have Temperature-dependent Sex Determination (TSD), which means that sex is determined by the temperature at which the eggs incubate, rather than genetically. (Higher temperatures produce females; lower temperatures produce males, in this particular species).
Back from my first trip up to the field site this season – we’ve had five turtles out of the water – four of them have nested successfully, and we’ve put a telemetry unit on the fifth, so hopefully we’ll find out out of the water again in a couple of days. We’re off to a really good start – we only had one nest this time last year. WHOO HOO TURTLES!
I was in the City today to weigh and measure our head-start western pond turtles. So, have a couple of pictures of baby turtles! The one in the first photo is my favorite – #201, who was the tiniest baby hatched last year in the lab. (Only 3.32 grams when s/he hatched). S/he’s more than ten times that weight now. *loves* Also, a goofy picture of me. 😛
Last week, my lab partner and I went out to our field site to see if last year’s hatchlings had emerged yet from their nests. The female pond turtles lay their eggs in the early summer (June is the most active month at our site), and the eggs hatch approximately three months later. There is evidence that young don’t leave the nest, though, until after the winter, something we were able to confirm on our excursion today!
We were fortunate in being at the site at exactly the right time this year. We visited a few of the nests we’d located last summer, and found babies emerging from some of them. The sort of blurry photo shows the hole they had dug for themselves to emerge – I know it’s a crappy photo, but that really is a baby turtle inside. We also found a couple that were just in the process of coming out of the ground. It was a pretty amazing thing to witness.
