One Turtle Tale with a Happy Ending

Terrapin volunteer Karen Strauss prepares to release "her" terrapin.

Terrapin volunteer Karen Strauss prepares to release a 10 year old turtle run over by a car on Lieutenant Island last summer.

The diamondback terrapin sniffed the salt marsh air for the first time since she was run over by a car on Lieutenant Island Road last June. She seemed to recognize her home and anxious to be free. I placed her into the water which was lapping at the edges of the road due to a big high tide, and she swam away quickly, diving deep. She swam towards a clump of marsh grasses, surfacing twice to breathe. Then she was gone.

Back home to the salt marsh.

Back home to the salt marsh.

 

This story actually began early in the morning on June 29th, when a female terrapin crawled out of the marsh looking for a place to nest and encountered a road where she was hit by a car. She soon was found by a kindhearted someone who placed her by my parked red truck, which is well known to many island residents.

Terrapin after being run over. Despite the blood, Karen knew this turtle had a good chance of surviving.

Terrapin after being run over. Despite the blood, Karen knew this turtle had a good chance of surviving. (photo by Karen Strauss)

When I first saw her, my stomach clenched. But once I examined her, I realized that she was in pretty amazing shape considering she’d just been run over. I started thinking that if we could get her to Tufts (Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine) she might just survive. Terrapin field leader Rebecca Shoer retrieved her and started the ferrying process to Tufts which included lifts from sea turtle researcher Karen Dourdeville and turtle volunteer Tim O’Brien.

The suture pin will allow the split carapace to heal on its own.

The suture pin will allow the split carapace to heal on its own. (photo by Karen Strauss)

At Tufts, vets maneuvered her carapace back into place and secured it with a steel suture through her twelfth marginal scutes. In order to push her shell together, the vets induced her to expel her eggs, which were placed in an incubator where they remain. The break in the carapace was dangerously close to the spine and two weeks in, inflammation caused paralysis in her right rear leg. She was given anti-inflammatory medicine and in a few weeks her leg function returned. She received physical therapy, including going outside to absorb UVB light to strengthen her shell. The vets at Tufts did an excellent job, as you can see from this photograph just before her release.

Thank you, Tufts!

Thank you, Tufts! (photo by Karen Strauss)

This truly was one lucky turtle. She was the only survivor during a summer where the sanctuary received reports of a record 20 turtles hit by cars in Wellfleet and Eastham. Seventeen were adult female terrapins out on nesting runs, two were box turtles and there was one snapping turtle. Last year, only eight turtles were reported hit by cars. All of these turtles were either killed or had to be euthanized.

With a threatened species, the damage to the population from the loss of even one breeding female is a setback. It takes a female hatchling 10 years to reach sexual maturity. A 10 year old has the potential to lay an average of 12 eggs in each of her two annual clutches. A female that survives being run over may have at least 20 years of breeding years remaining.That is a total of 160 to 240 hatchlings, of which perhaps two to five will survive to breeding age, with no guarantee that any will be female. The population does not recover easily from the loss of a single adult female, never mind seventeen!

I hope I’ll meet this turtle again next June. I’ll know her again no matter how much the carapace continues to heal. I hope she’ll be looking both ways before she crosses the road and that drivers also will keep a close eye out for her.

Terrapin crossing road to or from nesting.

Terrapin crossing road to or from nesting.

Karen Strauss, creator of this post, is one of Wellfleet Bay’s hardworking terrapin nest volunteers who monitors her sites on multiple days of the week between June and September. She’s also a veteran sea turtle rescuer.

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