Diamondback Terrapins in the News

This morning, the Savannah Morning News featured an article about diamondback terrapins on the front page.  Diamondback terrapins are a protected species of turtle in the state of Georgia, but TERPS (Terrapin Educational Research Program of Savannah) has observed a rapid decrease in their estimated population size.  The article was written by Mary Landers, who met with me and Andrew Neidlinger to collect some information about the turtles and watch us release 4 captive baby turtles.  The article is available online, and includes a video interview with Andrew.  Here's the link for it.
http://savannahnow.com/news/2013-06-23/crossing-us-80-treacherous-trip-savannah-nesting-turtles#.Uch_G9hByjc

It's a fortuitous day for the turtles for sure.  Not only are they in the news today, Andrew, Samuel Peabody, and I collected a dozen eggs from wild females last night.  We will hatch them in captivity, conduct research on them, and release them next summer.  Here is a photo of one of the clutches of eggs.

We collected data from the wild females that we caught, and marked them before releasing them.  One of the females was actually a survivor of a traffic accident.  We could see damage on her shell, but obviously she is continuing to thrive in her natural habitat.  Click on the link above to read Mary Landers's article and watch a video of Andrew's interview.  You might even see me as I release some of the baby turtles.