Andrea ColtonViews:
Monday
Last week marked the beginning of our experimental Spotted Turtle sampling period. We don’t typically trap turtles in the fall, as they aren’t as active as in the spring when they’re searching for mates. However, Georgia’s warmer weather allows Spotted Turtles to remain somewhat active for more months out of the year compared to northern populations. In the fall, the intense Georgia summer heat that renders turtles inactive begins to subside, so we’re hopeful to find some in the coming weeks. Perhaps last week was still too hot, or the wetland complex we were trapping in was just too large, allowing the turtles to evade us successfully.
This week, we trapped in two locations. One contained several isolated wetlands, and the other is a long-term monitoring site. Our turtle technician, Jesus Riverol, and I headed to the first site. This wetland had trappable water that hadn’t dried up from the summer heat, along with lots of vegetation and downed logs, perfect for turtles to bask on and hide among. Unfortunately, the thick vegetation created a wall around the wetland, but after a fair amount of struggling through trees with all our traps, we managed to reach it.
Our Spotted Turtle trapping efforts are part of a regional initiative that spans the eastern coast of the United States. With many collaborators contributing data across multiple states, a standardized protocol is essential for comparing results. To ensure this, we define and trap within 200m-radius plots. Jesus set up the plot on his GPS, and we began setting our traps. We then moved on to the next wetland, a much easier one to access, and repeated the process. Finally, we drove to the long-term monitoring site and set up two more reference plots there as well.
Tuesday
Today, Jesus and I went to check our traps. While we check traps, we also do visual encounter surveys within our reference plots. Since turtles can be notoriously tricky to trap, we take our time searching and wandering to increase the chances of coming across one. Jesus and I each took a side of the wetland and wandered around in the shallow water, paying particular attention to areas where direct sunlight provided complete visibility of any turtles that might be shuffling around in the leaf litter at the bottom of the water. As we wandered, we met back up at our traps to check what we’d caught.
The first plot at our first site yielded nothing but a Bullfrog and a Two-Toed Amphiuma, but the second plot gave us a couple of Eastern Mud Turtles. I made the mistake of reaching toward the front of one turtle, who did not hesitate to bite me. Mud Turtles may be small, but their bites are painful!
On our way back to the trucks, we came across a non-aquatic turtle species: an Eastern Box Turtle. Unlike other turtles, box turtles have a hinge on the bottom of their shell (called a plastron) that allows them to completely enclose themselves. The turtle we came across used this hinge well and hid from us nearly the entire time.
The two plots at the second site also produced Eastern Mud Turtles but no Spotted Turtles. The water here was sparse, however, so turtles may still be hunkered down in mud and leaves from the summer.
Wednesday
Today was supposed to be another trap check day, but it turned into a trap pull day. We started the morning in a downpour ahead of the full force of Hurricane Helene. We place small sections of pool floats in all our traps to ensure they float if water levels rise unexpectedly, but if we know there will be flooding ahead of time, we remove our traps. For our safety, as well as the safety of any animals that might get caught in a trap during the upcoming hurricane, we decided to pull traps today.
Hauling traps around makes looking for turtles difficult, so we focused on getting the traps out of the wetlands and ended up with a free afternoon and no rain. Jesus and I used this time to explore another site further south that is adjacent to known Spotted Turtle records. We spent some time driving around and checking Google Maps for patches of wetlands to visit. Many areas have good vegetation and standing water, but water levels are nearly too deep. Regardless, there are a couple of spots that appear appropriate for Spotted Turtles. We even spotted a ditch along the side of the road. Man-made or agricultural ditches have been known to attract multiple species of turtle, though for many, it’s out of necessity, as ditches may be the last areas in altered landscapes to hold water.
Thursday
Today was an office day as we waited for the impact of Hurricane Helene. I still had power where I was, so our Science Initiative was able to hold a quick meeting for updates on what we’d been doing over the past few weeks. Once the meeting ended, I turned to the site lists I’d been working on for over a month. The Orianne Society is looking to sample for Spotted Turtles in Florida, Georgia, and South Carolina in the coming years. Between these three states, there are hundreds of properties to choose from for Spotted Turtle sampling.
I’d been site-scouting within Georgia, and we’d had meetings with biologists in other states that helped me refine the list. Some sites that looked great on maps turned out disappointing upon inspection. Hopefully, my scouting missions will allow us to identify sites with at least a few areas of ideal habitat before we begin our extensive trapping efforts next year!
Friday
Rain events are good at bringing out turtles, so Jesus and I did our best to complete visual encounter surveys at our sites today. We were fortunate to be in an area where travel wasn’t greatly impeded by the hurricane. We spent a couple of hours at each site searching for turtles. Our previously dry, long-term monitoring site now had plenty of water, and recently inundated patches of land tend to draw in turtles, so we had plenty of ground to cover. Still, we had no luck finding any today.
High winds from the hurricane blew a lot of leaves and small branches into the wetlands, which greatly reduced visibility and provided even more opportunities for turtles to elude us.
Spotted Turtles are one of our priority species – learn more about Spotted Turtles here.
