Andrea ColtonViews:
Monday
Our Spotted Turtle team is sadly starting to wrap up for the season. As the weather gets warmer and vegetation starts to green, standing water is rapidly disappearing from the ephemeral wetlands that Spotted Turtles frequent. It has been an abnormally dry spring to boot, so it has been a struggle for our technicians to find water, even at the wettest part of the season. Despite this, my technicians have been handling the struggle well! I made my way down to Florida at the beginning of this week to help Delana. Florida reached consistently high temperatures quicker than South Carolina and Georgia, so she’s been struggling to find good habitat for a while. And while my help does nothing for water levels, it’s at least nice to have extra hands to carry and set traps when a decent portion of your day is spent searching for water. While Delana checked the western portion of the property, I was able to check the eastern portion. Predictably, once-beautiful wetlands were bone dry. The best I could find was the Steinhatchee River itself, which is not the habitat we wanted. Luckily, there are two spots that typically seem too deep for setting traps but were at a decent level due to the vanishing water. This was also not ideal habitat, as it appears Spotted Turtles prefer wetlands that are shallow throughout, but it’s better than nothing, and sometimes they do turn up in places you wouldn’t expect! We also managed to get traps in small ditches along the side of the road, which is a perfect example of turtles utilizing what we would think of as poor habitat. In fact, many species of turtles can be found frequenting ditches full of water!
Tuesday
With only 15 somewhat concentrated traps out, our morning trap check went by quickly. Half the time was probably spent driving between wetlands. We caught a few Eastern Mud Turtles, but that was it. Disappointing, but unfortunately typical in the search for Spotted Turtles in Florida. What we lacked in turtles, we made up for in Ribbon Snakes. Many trees and shrubs around the wetland contained a Ribbon Snake stretched out on a branch, trying to catch some morning sun. In the afternoon, it became clear that it was not a good week for tires. Alan, our South Carolina tech, had a flat tire on Monday that forced him to alter his trapping week to Tuesday–Saturday, and that bad luck traveled down to Delana. As she was leaving the site, a rogue branch slashed a hole in her tire. I helped her change it and get her a new tire, which thankfully went very smoothly. Finally, at 3:30 p.m., I was able to make the 4-hour drive back home.
Wednesday
For the first time this season, I was able to do some solo trapping! So much of my time has been split between helping technicians at their sites, continuing the search for box turtles to track in southern Georgia, and collecting eDNA samples, it was nice to have a simple few days of setting and checking traps. Even better, the spot is very close to me in Savannah, so I only had about a 20-minute drive! I headed over, loaded myself up with traps, and started searching for water. As I had anticipated, this site was quickly drying up as well. There was a ton of vegetation and muck around that tells me these wetlands would be great for Spotted Turtles—I just need to get here earlier in the season next time. Despite the lack of water, I was able to set 7 traps and hoped that the much-needed rain over the next few days would entice turtles out.
Thursday
The first animal I was greeted with at the wetland today was a Barred Owl. It spent some time swooping around the area and getting yelled at by other, smaller birds who were not fans of its presence. I also spooked a large Cottonmouth, who promptly curled up and shook its tail to intimidate me. They always have a habit of blocking the most convenient path, so I begrudgingly sloshed through the mud to get around it. Unfortunately, the only thing in my traps today was a Two-Toed Amphiuma. We often catch Amphiuma when looking for Spotted Turtles, so I was at least reassured that I was in good habitat. I made my way back home to do what seems to take up a lot of my time lately: booking hotel rooms. Many sites are a decent drive away from where my technicians are based, so I am often searching for, booking, and filling out credit card authorization forms for 2–3 people a week. Nothing difficult, but it always takes longer than you’d expect!
Friday
My walk to the traps started with some unexpected excitement today. I smelled a strong scent of smoke and started worrying I was going to walk into a prescribed burn, when I noticed a singular tree on fire. Luckily, the flames were small and easy to reach, so I was able to throw some water on it, but it was clear from the charred trunk and smoldering bark on the ground that it had been burning for some time. Nothing around the tree showed any signs of fire, so I figured it was likely this tree was struck by lightning during the thunderstorms last night! Georgia pine forests are adapted to handle fire, and it’s a requirement for healthy landscapes, but it’s preferred that any burns are planned and controlled. The rest of the day was not as exciting. The only turtle in my traps was a small Yellow-Bellied Slider. I also found a small Eastern Mud Turtle on the trail, making her way between two wetlands. Once everything was packed up in the truck, I drove home and disinfected all the equipment. We spray down all traps, poles, bait canisters, and equipment used to measure turtles between every site to avoid spreading pathogens from one population to another.
