Help Save the Box Turtles!

We are all eagerly awaiting spring and the arrival of our box turtles to come out of hibernation. We’ve been tracking them throughout the winter which is not nearly as exciting as when they are out and moving the rest of the year. Over the last few weeks they have shown signs of beginning to wake up. Our turtle named “ALM” was found with a small head-sized burrow near her shell. We could find exactly where she was because her transmitter antenna was sticking up among the pine needles. At some point between now and May, they should awaken and the adventure will begin! Our spring interns have been learning how to use radio telemetry to track the box turtles. It's much easier to find non-moving animals in the winter rather than active animals in the summer. Intern Susie said "well that was rewarding," after taking the long way through briars, branches, and mud to find our turtle "BWX." Once we knew where he was, we realized we had a pretty direct route off our trail, but our telemetry receiver didn't want to tell us that. The last few weeks in Durham, NC have been a little warmer than usual, with temperatures in the 70s. Between the weather and the burrow found near “ALM,” I suspect the turtles will come out within the next few weeks.

In previous years we have held a box turtle guessing game, for you to guess when our box turtles would come up from hibernation. This year we want to get you, your family, and your friends more involved in conservation and want to encourage you to become citizen scientists! Those of you that spot a box turtle out of hibernation between now and April 21st, will be entered into a drawing for a free t-shirt! All you have to do is take a picture of the box turtle, just like the one shown. Bonus points if it includes a carpenter’s ruler. Photos that do not look like the one below (side views, far away, etc) will be disqualified, so make sure you know how to take a photo! You will take a photo of the carapace (or top of the shell) of the box turtle and e-mail it to us with either your address or GPS location. Send your “shellfie” to this e-mail: Turtle@piedmontwildlifecenter.org.

Not only will this encourage all of you to become citizen scientists, these photos will also be used to help increase our data for our photo ID app. We need a lot more photos for our photo ID algorithm, so that we can teach the app how to identify individual turtles.

Happy Turtling! We will announce the winner in our next update and the winner will be notified by e-mail!

Thanks!

Links:

• Become a box turtle researcher!
• PWC Box Turtle Project