Tara Ewers was a 2024 participant of the Catskill Science Collaborative Fellowship Program, coordinated by Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies.
It’s a cool spring morning in the Catskill Mountains. After driving for almost two hours from our office in Connecticut, my field mentor and I pull off on the side of a quiet paved road. I take out my phone to let my husband know where I will be for the next few hours, but just as in many other parts of the Catskills, there is no cell reception at this remote site.
We spend a few minutes gathering our gear before making the trek through the forest. After what seems like an eternity of dodging thorns, sticks, and any other sharp object that might tear a hole in waders, the canopy finally opens. We stand on the edge of a lush green field divided by a meandering stream. “Are you feeling turtle-y?” my field mentor John Foley asks. “Oh, I’m definitely feeling turtle-y,” I reply.
We are here looking for the imperiled wood turtle (Glyptemys insculpta), a species that was once common throughout eastern North America. Habitat loss and fragmentation due to human development, mortality resulting from collisions with motor vehicles and farm equipment, and illegal capture for the pet trade have all contributed to the estimated 50% decline of the species over the last century. They are listed as endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and as a species of special concern in New York.
Today John and I are surveying inside the Catskill Park for the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (NYSDEC). The agency, which oversees roughly 41% of all of land within the 700,000-acre Catskill Forest Preserve, is trying to gain a better understanding of the species’ population dynamics and distribution. This is my first field research project as a Master of Wildlife and Fisheries Resources student at Clemson University, and it is supported by a fellowship through the Catskill Science Collaborative.
Admittingly, I am not a turtle expert, but John is. Back in the offices of Great Hollow Nature Preserve, where I work as an environmental educator, we’ve affectionately nicknamed him “the turtle whisperer” for his uncanny ability to find turtles in the wild.
Over the course of this field season, John has passed down some of his wood turtle wisdom. These turtles prefer open canopy areas, a variety of vegetation that can act as both a food source and a shelter, and meandering streams. When John sees a site that checks all of his boxes, he gets a feeling that he can only describe as “turtle-y”. This particular site has all of these ideal habitat features for about as far as the eye can see. After working on this project for five weeks, I understand all too well that “turtle-y” feeling. Unfortunately, maps and habitat models can’t be produced based on feelings. For that we need quantifiable habitat data and wood turtles.
Trying to locate a five-to-nine-inch turtle in the middle of hundreds of acres of vegetation is akin to finding a needle in a haystack. Wood turtles live both on land and in streams. The amount of time they spend in either place depends largely on the time of year and the time of day. During the spring, wood turtles emerge from their winter hibernation in streams to forage in the floodplains, bask in the sun, and mate, making this an ideal time of year to look for wood turtles.
We start the survey process by picking a random point in the stream. Here we are measuring for water temperature, depth, width, flow, and substrate type. We make notes about the sun exposure and whether the stream banks are steep or if they’re a gentle slope where a turtle could easily climb out — “off-ramps”, as I like to call them. At a random adjacent plot within the floodplain, we note various habitat features such as the type of ground-cover vegetation, the percent tree canopy cover, and the sun exposure. We repeat this process every 200 meters until we reach our goal or are forced to stop due to private property lines or dangerous conditions.
Between each survey point, John and I search both the stream and the floodplain for turtles. Today I am focused on the stream, which seems promising with its sandy banks and its many twists and turns. Sandy banks are important for nesting, but in many of the streams we’ve surveyed they’ve been overgrown with invasive plants like mugwort and Japanese knotweed. After an hour I spot something exciting: turtle tracks and scat. I call John over and we now focus our search on the adjacent stream bank. Using the handle-end of a fishing net we sweep away the vegetation in hopes of uncovering the turtle who made the tracks. It doesn’t take long for us to hone-in on a large shrub. “Ah ha!” yells John. I make my way around to the other side of the shrub and see the telltale flat shell of a wood turtle.
I pick the turtle up and quickly determine from its flat lower shell that this is a female. Judging from her size and markings, we can tell that she is well into sexual maturity, which doesn’t happen until a wood turtle reaches about 15 years of age. We measure and record her size and weight before assigning her a unique notch code. Using a triangular file, two notches are made on the outermost segments of her shell. These notches will remain visible even as the turtle continues to grow, allowing future researchers to monitor and track individuals. The process of measuring, notching, and documenting takes roughly 10 minutes. We then release the turtle back where we found her with the hope that she will go on to lay a clutch of eggs in the coming weeks.
Our field season eventually yields a total of 23 wood turtles. While this may not sound like a significant number of individuals, it matches the total number of wood turtles officially reported in and around Catskill Park between 1990 and 2020. Even more significant was the discovery of wood turtles in nine new sites. Finding these occupied streams may help to protect the surrounding habitat from future development or fragmentation.
The data collected as part of this project will be used to help biologists and land managers gain a better understanding of the wood turtle’s status throughout the region as well as their habitat needs, and may offer hope that these small creatures can continue to inhabit the vast wilderness of the Catskills.
Tara Ewers was a 2024 participant of the Catskill Science Collaborative Fellowship Program, coordinated by Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies. A master’s student at Clemson University, Tara conducted wood turtle surveys in the Catskills for NYSDEC with her field mentor John Foley, a naturalist at the Great Hollow Nature Preserve and Ecological Research Center. Tara created a series of shapefiles and maps in ArcGIS from data collected in the field in an effort to help land managers at NYSDEC make more informed decisions.
