We started this week nice and early on Monday morning setting a plethora (27!) of traps along the Des Plaines river with Paul from the USDA! While we didn't catch any turtles that day, Kami and I did get some good practice with using the waders. Each of the different species we work with have [...]
What a week! This was a trap week, and we had some wild stuff happening. We caught plenty of turtles, and even a few Blanding's that have never been caught before! We gave them ID's and names right there in the field and released them. One of them became "Porkchop" - he's definitely going to [...]
This week the Walder team visited Lake County’s field site where Varun Seth and Marg Bednarek track Blanding’s turtles. On the first day out with the team, Sam Johnson (Walder Foundation research A victory picture of Marg thinking this was Mickey before finding out it was really Honeybunz. technician) teamed up with Marg [...]
Hello turtle-loving humans! Thank you for your interest in the Wildlife Epidemiology Laboratory’s (WEL) participation in the Walder Foundation. The focus of this research is to understand infectious disease epidemiology at the community level, so instead of focusing on a single species of turtle (as the Kane County and Walder Foundation Team taking names [...]
And just like that, our first week of the season has come to and end and boy has it been an adventure. We started off the week with the amazing Dr. Laura and Sam helping us catch a mix of Blandings, Painted, and Snapping turtles. Our Kane Co field Biologist Bill was amazing and placed [...]
Hello Turtle Friends and Welcome to the first official post of the 2023 Kane County Turtle Field Season blog! This blog is brought to you by your friendly neighborhood vet students Surina and Nick. Now for a little get to know you... Surina just finished her first year of veterinary medical school at the [...]
Hello and welcome to the Cook County blog -- where we will be sharing our summer field-work adventures with you! School is out, finals are over, and field season is in full swing! This week was a big one for Kate and I as we transitioned out of school-mode and gear up for what is [...]
Hello from your 2023 Lake County Turtle Team! Last Saturday, after wrapping up finals, we packed up the car and made our way to Lake County for the summer. This week, I am brushing up on my radio telemetry skills, and Varun (who was here last summer) has been training me to perform physical exams [...]
When I pictured my academic path, I rarely, if ever, thought about turtles. When I tell people I am a vet student, the most common response is: “Aw, you must really like dogs and cats.” And, of course, like most veterinary students (and people in general), I love our fluffy friends. But what about the [...]
Hey hey everyone, welcome back to another Cook County weekly update! I got back from Poland on the 4th of July, and after waiting 3 whole hours for my luggage to emerge from the conveyer belt (of course, it was the last one to come out), I was on my [...]
