Simply put, a wetland habitat is an outdoor ecosystem containing reeds, aquatic invertebrates, amphibians, and of course, water. It’s a place where many types of fresh water life convene to reproduce, rear young and acquire the resources they need for survival. Unsurprisingly, most natural wetlands are forgotten, and subsequently neglected, due to their annual [...]
May 18th 2016 It was a sunny day at Kickapoo State Recreation Area with little to no wind. We captured eight turtles in total during a 2 hour search effort. An added gem to this search effort is that it correlates with Jeremy's PhD study! His radiotelemetry project with Eastern Box Turtles was planned [...]
To increase the sample size of my study, we’ve decided to search for adult frogs at night. We’re assuming that elevated daytime temperatures cause the frogs to seek refuge under water or in dense plant thickets and that they’ll be more visible and/or active at night during cooler periods. Typically this exercise involves arriving at [...]
May 17th 2016 It was a cloudy day at Kennekuk County Park with no wind. We captured nine turtles in total during our 2.5 hour search effort. The quirky thing is that we caught the same amount of turtles as we did on Day #1! Kennekuk's trail map. [...]
The Amphibian Pathogen Project (APP) has officially begun and the students, teachers and myself survived some sweltering 9-hour days. A typical field day involves: 1-2 teachers, 3-4 students, 3-4 different wetlands and lots of critter catching! We use nets, buckets and our hands to catch the animals before we process them. Ideally, we’d catch mostly [...]
Vlog is a video blog per Erin, who is the student completing the Blanding's Turtle research. :) Turtle Team utilizes canines to capture Eastern Box Turtles and I explain the details behind this in the vlog below: John Rucker (left) and Dr. Matt Allender (right) holding one of the [...]
Follow Erin around for a day in her video blog!
May 16th 2016 It was a mostly sunny day at Middle Fork State Wildlife Area (a.k.a. Collison) with little to no wind. Collison, as a site, is right down the road from Kickapoo State Recreation Area. We captured nine turtles in total during our 2 hour search effort. Not only was it a beautiful [...]
Greetings from Nature Lane! I arrived safely in Oak Ridge, TN with all of my gear on the evening of June 1. Packing my personal supplies took about one day, as did packing the bulk of my lab items, but somehow it seems as though I’ve forgotten a few things! During my time here, I’m [...]
This week, Erin talks about Baby Blanding's in the head start program. Donate to Lake County's head start program here: https://www.lcfpd.org/preservation-foundation/adopt-a-turtle/
