Research assistant Molly Wright on the trail for radio-tagged turtles. (Photo by David Sommerstein)
Turtles like to live in wet, marshy areas. But they make their nests in dry areas, like in the gravel on the side of roads. Researchers are trying to determine how many turtles are becoming road kill and what effect that’s having on their populations. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s David Sommerstein reports:
Transcript
Turtles like to live in wet, marshy areas. But they make their nests in dry areas, like in the gravel
on the side of roads. Researchers are trying to determine how many turtles are becoming roadkill
and what effect that’s having on their populations. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s David
Sommerstein reports:
Biologist Tom Langen spends a lot of time walking along roads in northern New York State. A
professor at Clarkson University, he and his team of researchers catch turtles and put an
identifying tag on each one. So when they find one that’s been run over, they know who it is.
“…and by looking at the number that we find that are hit, and the number that are hit that have
been caught before, we can estimate the population size and what percentage are being hit.”
Langen says killing adult turtles has a big effect on the population because they reproduce for
decades. He says the project could persuade road engineers to build tunnels and other passages.
That way turtles and other animals will be able to cross the road and get to the other side safely.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m David Sommerstein.