{"id":10673,"date":"2012-05-10T08:12:33","date_gmt":"2012-05-10T13:12:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/?p=10673"},"modified":"2012-05-10T08:57:42","modified_gmt":"2012-05-10T13:57:42","slug":"key-turtle-spotlights-difference-between-cape-cod-bay-and-buzzards-bay-terrapins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/?p=10673","title":{"rendered":"Key Turtle Spotlights Difference Between Cape Cod Bay and Buzzards Bay Terrapins"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Sue Wieber Nourse:\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0Female\u00c2\u00a0(Left) and Male (Right)\u00c2\u00a0<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

On Monday, May 7th, Sue Wieber Nourse took advantage of a light southwest breeze, bright sunshine and temperature in the low sixties to paddle Sippican Harbor in search of Northern Diamondback Terrapins.\u00c2\u00a0 A week of chilled temperatures and overcast skies\u00c2\u00a0had driven SouthCoast terrapins back into brumation. She netted two adult terrapins.\u00c2\u00a0 Sue snagged\u00c2\u00a0a 6-year-old adult male\u00c2\u00a0that had never been caught before.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0Sue also\u00c2\u00a0netted\u00c2\u00a0a 14-year-old female terrapin that we had first observed on July 2nd, 2005 as a prepubescent, 7-year-old.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

<\/object><\/p>\n

Sue Wieber Nourse Captures\u00c2\u00a0Terrapin Pair from Kayak<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

The Sippican Harbor population of terrapins has been studied by the Turtle Journal team since spring 2003 when\u00c2\u00a0its existence\u00c2\u00a0was first confirmed.\u00c2\u00a0 In the ten research seasons since then, we have estimated an at risk population of under 100 adult terrapins resides in the Sippican estuary.\u00c2\u00a0 With those dramatically depressed numbers, few juvenile “recruits” are seen by researchers.\u00c2\u00a0 So, there is little opportunity to follow a prepubescent female through her lifecycle to maturity in order to gain insight into\u00c2\u00a0a growth model for Buzzards Bay terrapins.\u00c2\u00a0 Based on the significantly larger size of\u00c2\u00a0mature females in Buzzards Bay\u00c2\u00a0compared\u00c2\u00a0to\u00c2\u00a0those observed in Cape Cod Bay, Wellfleet Bay and Pleasant Bay terrapin populations, we had assumed that Sippican turtles would demonstrate a steeper growth curve.\u00c2\u00a0 Yet, the challenge in such a small and aging population was acquiring confirmatory data.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Male #1039 (Left) and Key Female Recapture #283 (Right)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

That’s what made Sue’s capture of Terrapin #283 so special.\u00c2\u00a0 This turtle was first captured as a prepubescent female in 2005 when she was aged at 7 years old.\u00c2\u00a0 She measured 14.71 centimeters (cm)\u00c2\u00a0carapace length and 12.81 cm plastron length; she weighed 487 grams back then.\u00c2\u00a0 On Monday, now at 14 years of age, she had grown to 20.45 cm carapace length and 18.35 cm plastron length; she weighed 1400 grams.\u00c2\u00a0 These latter numbers would be representative of nearly a 40 year old terrapin in the Cape Cod Bay population.<\/p>\n

\u00c2\u00a0\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Cape Cod Bay Growth Chart (Post-2002 Research Season)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

As indicated in this chart from our comprehensive 2003 report on Northern Diamondback Terrapins in Cape Cod Bay,\u00c2\u00a0we had measurements on\u00c2\u00a0100 individual prepubescent females positively aged at 7.\u00c2\u00a0 The average carapace length, plastron length and weight were 13.76 cm, 12.19 cm and 476.48 grams.\u00c2\u00a0 At 7 years old, Sippican Terrapin #283 was\u00c2\u00a0only a few % points larger than the Cape Cod average and well within\u00c2\u00a0expected deviation for a prepubescent female of that age.<\/p>\n

For the 2003 report, we had\u00c2\u00a026 mature\u00c2\u00a0Cape Cod Bay females positively aged at 14.\u00c2\u00a0 The average carapace length, plastron length and weight were 18.17 cm, 16.30 cm and 1033.24 grams.\u00c2\u00a0 At 14 years old, Sippican Terrapin #283 is already more than 12.5% larger and weighs\u00c2\u00a035% more than the average Cape Cod 14-year-old female.\u00c2\u00a0 In fact, very few Cape Cod terrapins ever attain a 20 cm length; if they did, it would be at about 40 years of age.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Key Terrapin #283 (14-Year-Old Female)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

While we had assessed for some time that mature female terrapins in Buzzards Bay were 10% to 15% larger than their Cape Cod Bay counterparts, #283 marks one of the first Sippican females to provide\u00c2\u00a0confirmation of the steeper female growth curve required to attain this significantly larger size.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00c2\u00a0Sue Wieber Nourse Paddles Sippican Harbor<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

With a tiny, at risk population\u00c2\u00a0that produces\u00c2\u00a0few juvenile recruits, it’s not an easy chore to acquire key specimens to fill in the data gaps to confirm or refute hypotheses.\u00c2\u00a0 Thanks to Sue’s capture of Terrapin #283, some of those data\u00c2\u00a0holes can begin to be closed.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0Turtle Journal will continue to search for such important finds during the 2012 season, while we try to reverse the\u00c2\u00a0downward trend of the Sippican Harbor population in order to stem extirpation of Northern Diamondback Terrapins\u00c2\u00a0from this Buzzards Bay estuary.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sue Wieber Nourse:\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0Female\u00c2\u00a0(Left) and Male (Right)\u00c2\u00a0 On Monday, May 7th, Sue Wieber Nourse took advantage of a light southwest breeze, bright sunshine and temperature in the low sixties to paddle Sippican Harbor in search of Northern Diamondback Terrapins.\u00c2\u00a0 A week of chilled temperatures and overcast skies\u00c2\u00a0had driven SouthCoast terrapins back into brumation. She netted two […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[23],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10673"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10673"}],"version-history":[{"count":59,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10673\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10745,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10673\/revisions\/10745"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10673"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10673"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10673"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}