{"id":5307,"date":"2001-05-25T21:14:39","date_gmt":"2001-05-26T02:14:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/?p=5307"},"modified":"2010-03-11T21:22:12","modified_gmt":"2010-03-12T02:22:12","slug":"back-to-square-one-%e2%80%94-25-may-2001","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/?p=5307","title":{"rendered":"Back to Square one \u00e2\u20ac\u201d 25 May 2001"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"05-25-1<\/a><\/p>\n

Is This Outfit Appropriate\u00c2\u00a0to Capture Cold-Blooded Animals?<\/em><\/strong>\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

When on 22 April turtles began emerging from their winter sleep, and by 1 May when water temperature over the tidal flats had reached 72\u00c2\u00b0 Fahrenheit, it seemed the terrapin season had sprinted to a record start.\u00c2\u00a0 We should know better.\u00c2\u00a0 After ten days of persistent easterly winds blowing off the North Atlantic and storm fronts smothering the Cape in grayness, water temperatures have plummeted.\u00c2\u00a0 This morning\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s reading barely hit 55\u00c2\u00b0F, the apparent threshold temperature in Wellfleet Bay for terrapins to enter and leave brumation.\u00c2\u00a0 Yesterday not a single female was seen swimming through the channel nor had one been captured in Blackfish Creek this entire week.\u00c2\u00a0 Research assistant Maureen Ryan, who reported for duty from college in Wyoming on Tuesday, wondered aloud what had become of those balmy swimming trunk days I wrote about in early May.\u00c2\u00a0 Was it some cruel hoax?\u00c2\u00a0 If so, the turtles weren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t laughing.<\/p>\n

\"05-25-2<\/a><\/p>\n

Two Females and a Male Terrapin Return to Blackfish Creek<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The three terrapins captured this morning were all caked in mud as though they had just emerged from brumation.\u00c2\u00a0 Yet, all three had already been seen this year.\u00c2\u00a0 Female 920 came through the rip paired with a male on 23 April; male 720 swam the channel on 29 April.\u00c2\u00a0 Terrapin 1006, another female, was spotted on both 5 and 10 May.\u00c2\u00a0 So, it was a surprise to see them all painted in mud, cold to the touch, and acting very sluggish.<\/p>\n

Number 720, the male on the right, and #920, the female on the left, have both acquired a ring of light green algae clinging to their marginal scutes.\u00c2\u00a0 Both had absolutely clean carapaces when photographed in late April.<\/p>\n

\"05-25-3<\/a><\/p>\n

Female Terrapin #1006 Slips into Blackfish Creek<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The change in Terrapin 1006 was equally dramatic, although not physical.\u00c2\u00a0 Her behavior had completely changed in the last two weeks.\u00c2\u00a0 When first observed on 5 May, she was described as \u00e2\u20ac\u0153quite active\u00e2\u20ac\u009d; on the 10th, she was termed \u00e2\u20ac\u0153aggressive.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\u00c2\u00a0 Today, though, she was passive and sluggish.\u00c2\u00a0 She moved through the rip so slowly that no net was needed to capture her.\u00c2\u00a0 She could barely maintain controlled headway.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Is This Outfit Appropriate\u00c2\u00a0to Capture Cold-Blooded Animals?\u00c2\u00a0 When on 22 April turtles began emerging from their winter sleep, and by 1 May when water temperature over the tidal flats had reached 72\u00c2\u00b0 Fahrenheit, it seemed the terrapin season had sprinted to a record start.\u00c2\u00a0 We should know better.\u00c2\u00a0 After ten days of persistent easterly winds […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","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\/5307"}],"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\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5307"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5307\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5315,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5307\/revisions\/5315"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5307"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5307"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turtlejournal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5307"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}