Community Collaboration: Volunteers and TRCA Unite to Protect Turtle Nests
In late 2020, a group of volunteers using Facebook reached out to the Toronto and Region Conservation Authority (TRCA) wanting to help with protecting and monitoring turtle nests.
In 2021, due to COVID-19, TRCA trained volunteers online on how to find, protect, and monitor turtle nests. They gave them the tools they needed too.
Read this open access paper on the FACETS website.
In that year, they found 181 turtle nests and protected 75 of them with simple protective covers to keep predators away but that allows the turtle nests to incubate naturally. In 2022, they found 165 nests and protected 155 of them.
Volunteers also gathered important scientific data like where nests were, when they were found, how many eggs were in each nest and when did the hatchling emerge.
From the 75 protected nests in 2021, the volunteers recorded 81 Midland Painted Turtle hatchlings and 665 Snapping Turtle hatchlings. They also saved five Midland Painted Turtle eggs inside an injured turtle and 44 Snapping Turtle eggs from a nest that had been partly eaten.
They took these eggs to the Ontario Turtle Conservation Centre where they were kept in an incubator until they hatched. Then, they released the baby turtles back into the wetlands.
Working with the local volunteer group was a success. TRCA suggests other conservation groups team up with community volunteers to protect turtle nests too.
Read the paper — Social media-based community science for turtle nest monitoring and conservation by Marc Dupuis-Désormeaux, Grace Van Alstyne, Maureen Mueller, Ruth Takayesu, Vince D’Elia, Tisha Tan, and Suzanne E. MacDonald.
