This steamy August morning witnessed the first emergence of diamondback terrapin hatchlings on the SouthCoast of Massachusetts. Sixteen baby turtles were born today on a barrier beach in Marion. From the end of May through early July, female terrapins, a threatened species in the Commonwealth, swam ashore on coastal beaches in estuaries of Buzzards Bay and Cape Cod Bay. Now, after incubating in eggs beneath the warm summer sand for ten weeks, the first hatchlings have begun to emerge from the few nests that have avoided depredation. Without a little human kindness and assistance, predation rates for turtle nests soar into the 90% range.
 Threatened Diamondback Terrapin Hatchling Emerges
Don Lewis and Sue Wieber Nourse of Turtle Journal patrolled this barrier beach in Marion where they have documented terrapin nesting and have protected many such nests from predation. Wieber Nourse spotted hatchling tracks in the sand that disappeared into the surrounding salt marsh.
 First Terrapin Babies Emerge on SouthCoast
Lewis deduced the likely location of the nest from the tracks and gently excavated the area with his fingers. About three inches below the surface he began encountering baby turtles that had “pipped” their eggshells with their prominent egg tooth, but were still a bit too immature to venture safely into the wild. You can see in the photograph above how these babies were half in and half out of their eggs.
 Sand Covered Hatchling Scampers to Freedom
Unfortunately for these remaining hatchlings, ten of their siblings had left the nest over night. With the scent that they left behind in their discarded eggshells, they would have set off the dinner bell for a host of predators. These babies would have been devoured this evening as raccoons, skunks, foxes and other predators conduct their own hatchling patrols of the beach.
With a little help from human guardians, six terrapin babies were recovered from the nest. They still need a few more days of maturity before they can be safely released into the nursery salt marsh abutting the barrier beach. But their odds of survival have been significantly enhanced as turtle researchers work to restore declining populations of diamondback terrapins in Buzzards Bay estuaries. Terrapins are listed as a threatened species in Massachusetts.
Beyond terrapins on bayside beaches, other turtle hatchlings should be popping up throughout the SouthCoast within the next few weeks: Eastern box turtles in your yard, painted turtles and snappers in uplands surrounding lakes and ponds, and spotted turtles in wetlands and bogs. Advice from the Turtle Journal Team: Slow down and look down. The life you save may be a baby turtle.
We saw the first terrapin hatchling tracks on the SouthCoast of Massachusetts this morning. Within the next few weeks, baby turtles will begin emerging everywhere in the Northeast. Look down and save a baby turtle!
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Baby Turtles Emerge from Natural Nest and Take First Breath
One-inch, quarter ounce hatchlings are most vulnerable when they tunnel out in their version of the Great Escape. They scramble to camouflage and safety in nursery habitat where they spend the first two-to-three years of their lives, the Lost Years, evading predators that consider hatchlings a crunchy potato-chip like dessert.
Poke us, email us, call our hotline (508-274-5108) if you see hatchlings and you would like advice on how best to help them to safety.
Female Terrapin #272 — First Protected Nest @ Holly Beach
Once in a blue moon comes a turtle, a diamondback terrapin, that provides researchers with such rich material that we describe the event as a home run. Such a turtle, Terrapin #272, scrambled ashore at a newly discovered nesting site, Holly Beach, on the west coast of Sippican’s Outer Harbor.Â
This exquisite female had first been discovered by Turtle Journal in June 2005 at another nesting site. Today she revealed how well she has done in the intervening seven years. She hinted that deteriorating conditions at her former nesting beach had pushed her to a new location. She gave us 12 fresh and viable eggs to study and to protect. And with a little bit of good fortune, her nesting efforts will yield a clutch of perfect hatchlings in September to examine and to release as new recruits to restore the dwindling population of Sippican terrapins.
As Don approached the beach, he spied a turtle crawling swiftly through the grass. He dropped behind a boulder and a stand of phragmites to avoid disturbing her. The terrapin stopped here and there along her journey, she scratched the surface and threw dirt over her shell, and she went on. At one spot, she thrust her face into the soil, paused for a moment, then moved her powerful back legs over the sand, and began digging in earnest. Alternating left and right rear limbs, she probed deeply into the ground. After 15 minutes, she paused again, positioned herself over the hole, and began the laying cycle; deep breathing, dropping eggs and positioning them carefully in the egg chamber. Once the terrapin began to cover the nest, Don moved closer to film the final moments and to be sure he could find the now camouflaged nest.
Terrapin #272 in 2005 and Terrapin #272 in 2012
We first saw Terrapin #272 on 22 June 2005 on a nesting run at the barrier beach in Aucoot Cove. She was still gravid (carrying eggs) and weighed 990 grams. On July 17th of the same year, we saw her again on a nesting run for her second clutch of the year. She was gravid and weighed 913 grams. That weight loss is expected from first to second clutch, since a terrapin invests 10% to 15% of her body mass in each set of eggs.
Today, Terrapin #272 was nesting at Holly Beach, which is in the next estuary to Aucoot Cove. The turtle would have had to swim about a mile around Converse Point or crossed about a quarter mile on land to reach her new nesting site. Turtle Journal has long noted that nesting conditions on the Aucoot barrier beach were deteriorating due to increased human activity and continuous storm washover. We had speculated that turtles would be forced to find new nesting areas before long. Terrapin #272 is the first turtle that we have confirmed taking this predicted course of action.
In the intervening seven years, Terrapin #272 has grown almost a full centimeter in length. Her new weight, including the egg mass she had just deposited, was close to 1100 grams.
Neighbors Observe Terrapin Nest Excavation
After securing the turtle, Don and interested residents, examined the location that Terrapiin #272 had chosen to dig her nest. It was a grassy spot that would prove challenging for the eggs to avoid root and other predation. Since these eggs represent the first viable nest discovered at the new site, Don decided to relocate them to a secure turtle garden where they could incubate in safety Once hatchlings emerge in September, they will be returned to the nursery salt marsh abutting Holly Beach.
Lisa Holds Terrapin #272’s 12 Perfect Eggs
Resident Lisa Novakoff, whose home overlooks the nesting site, holds the 12 pink and perfect eggs deposited by Terrapin #272 at Holly Beach. Andretti, a young and inquisitive visitor, watches in amazement.
Terrapin #272’s 12 Eggs Weigh 94 Grams
An element of our research home run is to have access to the eggs of a known female (#272). We weighed the eggs to determine the overall clutch size (94 grams) to compare to the mother’s size. There would have been a few additional grams of “water” to add to the egg mass. Second clutch nests tend to be lighter than the first clutch, because mothers have already invested a large percentage of their body mass in their first set of egg. There also tends to be one or two fewer eggs in the second clutch.
Individual Egg Weighs 7.4 Grams
Since the nest was being relocated to a safe turtle garden, we had the opportunity to take measurements of each of the eggs. Later, we will compare these measurements to the eggs just prior to “pipping,” when the babies pierce the eggshell, and with the hatchlings once they emerge. The eggs ranged from 7.4 grams to 8.6 grams, and from 2.92 to 3.30 centimeters long, and from 1.94 to 2.03 centimeters in diameter.
Eggs Relocated to Safe Turtle Garden for Incubation
To ensure we can stretch a research triple into a home run, we relocated these viable eggs to a secure turtle garden and we capped the nest with a predator excluder. With a normal Cape Cod summer, we expect to see hatchlings emerge sometime around mid-September. As the time approaches, we hope Holly Beach residents will join Turtle Journal for a celebratory release party.
Terrapin #272 Jets to Freedom
Examination over; weights and measurements taken; and a job well and successfully done; Terrapin #272 left Holly Beach for Sippican’s Outer Habor. She raced to water’s edge and sped into the bay as though propelled by jets. So long, Terrapin #272; see you next year!
Turtle Journal, our friends, our colleagues and you have been privileged to rescue thousands of turtles through the years in our shared mission to save the world one turtle at a time. We give these troubled critters a nudge towards survival, we hope for the best, and we never see them again. On special occasions, and particularly within our three decade long longitudinal study of terrapins, we get the chance to see the rescued specimen again, but usually long afterwards. Today, though, we saw a terrapin that was rescued and released into the wild only three weeks ago; and she told us … with her data, of course … how well she has adjusted to her new life.
Mass Audubon Allen’s Pond Staff with “Bumpy”
Someone had dumped female terrapin #325 (Bumpy) in a fresh water pond at Buttonwood Park in New Bedford. Where that someone had found her originally is unknown. From her skin markings, she appears to be a Buzzards Bay terrapin. But whether she had been scooped from an estuary or a beach in Westport or Dartmouth or Fairhaven or Mattapoisett or Marion or Wareham or elsewhere, we shall never know. What we do know is that staff from Mass Audubon’s Allens Pond Wildlife Sanctuary spotted her at the New Bedford pond on June 14th, realized she did not belong and called Turtle Journal for identification of her species and a course of action to rescue her.
Terrapin Infested with Fresh Water Leeches
The first thing we did was to remove two large fresh water leeches that had embedded themselves into her right forelimb.
Terrapin #325 with Bumps and Distortions (Rear View)
Yes, Terrapin #325 has earned her nickname “Bumpy.” She has large and asymmetrical bumps along her vertebrals. She also has nine rather than the normal five vertebral scutes. Clearly, this turtle has multiple stories to tell, some about her life history and others about her genetics.
Terrapin #325 with Bumps and Distortions (Front View)
Yet, with leeches removed and given a few days to cleanse algae and slime she had accumulated in the fresh water, Terrapin #325 was ready to return to the wild; to real diamondback terrapin habitat, that is. Although we had no way to ascertain her home estuary, our research tells us that some Buzzards Bay terrapins swim extensively from estuary to estuary within the bay.  So, the most important factor for us was to find a safe and convenient, terrapin-friendly estuary from whence Bumpy could make her own life choices.
Bumpy (Terrapin #325) Released in Protected Cove
We released Terrapin #325 on June 17th. For her return to nature, we chose a protected, terrapin rich cove mid-way through Buzzards Bay. From there, she could easily chart her own course for the future. Little did we realize that we would encounter her again so soon … just three weeks later. And little did we appreciate how quickly she would re-adapt to her natural habitat.
Rescued Terrapin #325 Thriving in New Habitat
Sunday morning Turtle Journal received a call from Ed and Lisa at a terrapin nesting beach in the next estuary to the cove where Bumpy had been released. They had spotted a turtle and held it for us. Sure enough, it was Terrapin #325.  Bumpy either swam a mile around the point or crawled a quarter mile across the peninsula to reach this nesting site.Â
Her numbers tell the story. In a mere three weeks, Bumpy had grown 0.1 centimeter; she had gained 50 grams (nearly 5% of her body mass). And now she was quite pregnant, heavy with eggs and looking for a viable spot to deposit them. Not too shabby for three weeks of freedom!
“Bigfoot” of Massachusetts SouthCoast — Diamondback Terrapin
“An aura of mystery rivaling that of Bigfoot attends the diamondbacks of Buzzards Bay,” writes Daniel Sheldon Lee in his 2004 book, Buzzards Bay: A Journey of Discovery.  Lee continues, “They are not plentiful; in many of their habitats, nobody even knows they’re there.” Later Lee wrote, “Don Lewis, a local expert on the reptiles, claims that whenever he has found suitable habitat in Buzzards Bay, he has found terrapins. You simply need to be an expert to find them.” More accurately, Turtle Journal’s Don Lewis would say, you need a wide network of curious citizen scientists to alert you to signs of these Buzzards Bay “Bigfoots.”
Finding such elusive critters requries knowledge, expertise, practice and luck. The sort of “luck” that Pasteur described in his famous quote, “Fortune favors the prepared mind.”
Female Terrapin Leaves Tracks during Nesting Run
On shore to nest, female terrapins leave distinctive tracks in the soft sand. The plastron, her bottom shell, smooths the ground and often her tail carves a line down the center of this smoothness. Her powerful limbs leave “commas” in the sand bracketing the flat center. Seeing a turtle with tracks behind her helps to reinforce these lessons.
 Tracking the Elusive Diamondback Terrapin
In the field, it proves a little more challenging when you scour a well trodden beach for tracks that may, or may not, belong to the Buzzards Bay Bigfoot. On Thursday morning’s high tide, Turtle Journal identified terrapin tracks at a newly discovered nesting site in Sippican Harbor. The video above takes you along for the adventure. Will the trail end with only ephemeral footprints in the sand?  Or will we successfully track down a legendary diamondback terrapin?
Very Special Terrapin Reveals Sippican Secret
In this case, we not only discovered a rare diamondback terrapin, but this turtle gave us a research breakthrough. We have been capturing and marking terrapins in the Sippican Harbor mating aggregation for a decade. Yet, we had never found one of these turtles at a nesting site; not a single turtle. This one proved the first terrapin netted in the Head of Sippican Harbor to have been idenfitied at a nesting location.
Becky Nourse Nets Terrapin #265 in Sipican Harbor
This female, Terrapin #265,  was first captured at the Head of Harbor mating aggregation on May 30th, 2005 when she was a young lady of nine years of age. Back then she measured 18.7 centimeters shell length and weighed 1133 grams. Today, she has grown to 19.85 centimeters long and weighs 1344 grams. She also has the distinction of being the only diamondback terrapin that we have observed in Buzzards Bay (or Cape Cod Bay) with no spots, marks or patterns on her blue-gray skin.Â
With leadership from an engaged community of citizen scientists abutting this newly discovered  nesting site, Turtle Journal hopes we can make great strides to restore the dwindling terrapin population in Sippican Harbor.
