Pictures & Videos
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Squirt is a new turtle, meaning she has never been found by anyone in previous years participating in Mr. Crowley's Environmental Science class' Box Turtle telemetry study. Squirt was found by Mr. Crowley in the Rainy Day Valley. Squirt was randomly captured, along with 3 other box turtles, by Mr. Crowley to help our class track the home range and study the population of box turtles within the Lovett community. The first day meeting Squirt we took pictures to log Squirt in a binder for following years to identify if Squirt is recaptured and to help our group identify Squirt throughout the tracking process. After taking pictures, we taped a transmitter on to her lower back with camouflage duck tape to make sure she did not stand out to predators when put back into the woods. The transmitter will help us locate Squirt for future searches. Squirt's measurements and descriptions of her features, which can be found in the base line data, was also recorded.
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First time finding Squirt! She is much farther back within the Lovett woods than where she was originally found by Mr.Crowley in Rainy Day valley. We are not sure if this new location or Rainy Day valley is within Squirt's home range. We found her by using an antenna and receiver, which Harrison is holding in the pictures above. After turning the receiver to the correct channel, listed on the base line data, we decided where to go and how close we were by adjusting the gain. If the gain gets lower and the strength of the signal continues to increase, the closer you are to the transmitter and we were to Squirt. After getting 8s and 9s on the receiver (the strength goes up to 10) with the gain low, Harrison found Squirt. As shown in the video, she was found tucked in her shell, hidden under many leaves and branches, and very blended in. Data was recorded in our binder of the location, time, and description of the find. This binder along with ribbon, pens, a map, and camouflage duck tape, were all put into our backpack, which Harrison is wearing in our 5th and 6th picture and brought on every search.
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Again, with the help of our receiver and antenna Squirt's transmitter taped on her back was tracked. Squirt seems to not be moving much and was found a yard or two away from where she was found a week before. Squirt was yet again found tucked into her shell and very well-hidden. After finding Squirt data was recorded similar to the first find. A ribbon was placed on the closest tree to where Squirt was found, which is shown in the first picture. For every find there is a ribbon placed closest to where Squirt is found and a date is written on the ribbon. This helps the group know where Squirt has been found before and a general area of where to look for Squirt the next search.
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As we were walking to find Squirt a lower schooler at Lovett, Clifford, decided he wanted to help. He walked and searched with us and even researched box turtles on his phone to know what they look like and where they are often hidden. Yet again, Squirt was found close to the past 2 locations and was near a log. It took about 30 minutes to find Squirt, which is a little bit longer than the past 2 searches. This search took longer than the last two because Squirt was so well-hidden and a little bit farther down the hill than usual. As shown in the second picture, another tree was marked by a dated ribbon to help us form a boundary and in the future approximate Squirt's home range.
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After 3 weeks of not finding Squirt, even though his usual locations and between the marked trees were checked, Mr. Crowley joined us on our search. We did what is called a "power search" and looked for an hour and a half throughout the woods behind Lovett tracing all the outer edges, until we found that "Squirt" was no where near where she had been found the past 3 times and in a different valley. After hours of searching the transmitter was found, but not attached to Squirt. Squirt's transmitter fell off and although it could have been by an animal, it is reasonable to assume not due to the lack of bite marks on the transmitter. The transmitter was found South of the Denny field, which is behind Lovett, about 70 yards up the hill.
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Our new turtle, I-Turtle, has been found 3 times, twice by Mr. Crowley and once by our classmates, LE and Carter. Mr. Crowley found I-Turtle in a pine area at the back end of the Denny Field. Carter and LE found her near this area as well, 25 feet East from a huge pile of fallen trees and organic build up, and close to a creek. I-Turtle is a much smaller turtle compared to Squirt, which may make her more challenging to find.
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3 Extra Credit Turtles |
3 extra credit turtles were found within 2 weeks, while we were tracking I-Turtle. An extra credit turtle within our study is an box turtle found within the Lovett forest that is not currently being tracked. The first two turtles shown were found mating together and were passed by Harrison, while walking through the Lovett cross country trail. The third extra credit turtle, previously named Biggie Smalls, was found laying down next to I-Turtle under branches, which you can see in the picture below.
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After finding I-Turtle once, it took two more failed searches to finally find I-Turtle again, but it was done October 26! Although very open in the image, I-Turtle was found close to where we found her the first search, but was so small we would not have noticed her if it was not for Biggie Smalls laying next to her. I-Turtle was very active and after being picked up once to take a picture she began walking away down the hill towards the Denny Field. As shown in the second image, I-Turtle has a new transmitter and ribbon, which is a candy cane striped ribbon.
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Find 10
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This is our 4th find with I-Turtle and one of our trickiest. I-Turtle was buried far into the ground with piles of dead leaves over her. Once we knew we were close to her since we received a signal of 10 (the highest the receiver signal can go), but we still could not find her. We took the antenna off of the receiver and put the receiver near the ground and moved it around. This helped us getting a more accurate reading of where I-Turtle was hiding, since it is tracking the signal from a smaller range. Once over I-Turtle we got 10s again on the receiver, moved leaves around, and found I-Turtle. Once placed back on the ground I-Turtle tried to bury herself back into her original location. I-Turtle was found very close to her past few locations. This is because as it gets colder, box turtles tend to migrate less.
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Find 13: Last Find
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Last find with I-Turtle! She was found in under 20 minutes and she was hidden very deep in the soil covered by a big pile of dead leaves that were moved for the picture. As shown in the second picture, the closest tree was marked with a I-Turtle's candy cane striped ribbon. As shown in the last picture the transmitter was taken off.
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