Turtle Journal

Wellfleet’s Fox Island Surrounded by Icy Flood Tide

At mid-tide today, summer residents, retreating to the end of the universe for a weekend break from the mainland bustle, found the remains of a six-year-old diamondback terrapin on Indian Neck’s Fox Island.

Male Terrapin Carcass Resting on Icy Marsh

They found the turtle near the center of the island in the north quadrant, fairly deep into the interior and quite distant from the high water line.

Dead 10 cm Male Terrapin

This mature male measured 10 centimeters carapace length and 8.25 centimeters plastron.  He still sported clearly visible annual growth lines.  While decomposed and desiccated, there were no tooth marks nor scratches to indicate predation.

This afternoon a badly decomposed juvenile Kemp’s Ridley sea turtle was recovered from Truro’s Pamet marsh.

The tally for this year’s sea turtle strandings now stands at 46: 40 ridleys and 6 loggerheads.  By location: 1 stranded at Sandwich, 6 at Dennis, 19 at Brewster, 2 at Orleans, 8 at Eastham, 6 at Wellfleet, and 4 at Truro.  While beaches were scoured for sea turtles during the season, the more inaccessible marshes are still likely to turn up a few more remains throughout the winter and early spring.  While respectable, this season’s numbers fall far short of last year’s record of hundreds of sea turtles stranded on Cape Cod beaches.  Then again, the weather this season fell far short of last year’s temperatures, too.