SAFE Western Pond Turtle Video

I might be biased, but this is a fantastic video about western pond turtles . . . the segment starting at 5:00 features the field site where I did my thesis research. The fellow being interviewed is my advisor, Nick Geist. And that’s your’s truly measuring the turtles in preparation to release them back into the lake. SO FAMOUS! 🙂

These Crazy Cute Turtles Want their Lake Back

Hey, these are MY turtles! (Well, not just mine, but these are Geist Lab turtles. So I guess I could call them OUR turtles).

“Boxed in by a freeway, a golf course and a neighborhood, it’s a miracle that San Francisco’s Mountain Lake even exists. But not only is the tiny lake—located on the south end of the city’s Presidio park—still there, it now provides one of the few places in San Francisco where visitors can watch California’s only native aquatic turtle bask in the sun.”

Read the rest of the article here: http://ww2.kqed.org/science/2016/01/26/these-crazy-cute-baby-turtles-want-their-lake-back/

Mountain Lake Reintroduction Archive

This is a collection of posts about the reintroduction of western pond turtles into the Presidio. My lab hatched these turtles, and another grad student in my lab is doing research at the lake. My involvement with this project was limited to egg collection and hatching the turtles who would later be released. I am, however, quoted in one of the articles.

goga-mountain_lake_presidio_trust_600The Western Pond Turtles in remediated Mountain Lake are doing well (Richmond District Blog, June 02, 2016)

Threatened Species Of Turtle Now Thriving Again In San Francisco’s Mountain Lake  (CBS SF Bay Area, May 31, 2016)

Native turtles growing steadily at SF’s Mountain Lake (San Francisco Examiner, May 31, 2016)

Why is there an antenna attached to this western pond turtle? (Mother Nature Network, January 27, 2016)

These Crazy Cute Turtles Want Their Lake Back (KQED, January 27, 2016)

At Mountain Lake, One Last Chance to See the Turtles Off (Bay Nature, October 14, 2015)

SSU Teams Up With Bay Area Zoos to Help Save Threatened Turtles (Sonoma State University, October 6, 2015)

Super Science Saturday – Mountain Lake (Presidio of San Francisco Facebook, September 16, 2015)

Presidio Trust Partners with SF Zoo and Sonoma State to Return Native Turtles to Mountain Lake (Presidio Trust press release, September 12, 2015)

Native Turtles Return to Mountain Lake (SFNPS, August 31, 2015)

After Decades Away, Western Pond Turtles Come Home to Mountain Lake (Bay Nature, July 28, 2015)

Turtles returned to their historic home at Mountain Lake (SFGate, July 20, 2015)

Scientists to perform first-of-its-kind study on turtles released into SF lake (San Francisco Examiner, July 16, 2015

Mountain Lake At Presidio Growing In Diversity With Recovery Of Stickleback Fish And Other Species (National Parks Traveler, April 13, 2015

Presidio Trust Releases First Native Species Into Mountain Lake (Presidio Trust press release, April 03, 2015)

Bottom Up at Mountain Lake (Bay Nature, January 30, 2015)

Ready, Set, Reintroduce! (SFNPS, January 29, 2015)

San Francisco’s Presidio Trust Killing Fish to Save a Lake (AllGov California, October 27, 2014)

California Lake Poisoned to Get Rid of Invasive Fish (Seeker, October 20, 2014)

Presidio Trust unveils plan to rid Mountain Lake of invasive fish (SFGate, October 18, 2014)

Lake Effects (National Geographic, April 7, 2014)

All of These Monster Invasive Fish Came Out of One Small San Francisco Lake (Bay Nature, March 20, 2014)

Bringing life back to Mountain Lake (Bay Nature, February 27, 2017)

Western Pond Turtle Links

Here is a collection of links to articles I’ve written about western pond turtles.

This “Western Pond Turtle” category menu also includes a variety of content published by other people, most of which involves turtles from my lab. Just continue scrolling down through this category page to see articles, images, and videos I’ve shared from other sources.

My Thesis Research

In these posts, I talk about my master’s thesis research into the nesting behavior and nest site selection of western pond turtles.

0DCBA54F-CA4B-4DB2-9FA0-3EB636DE7A3EEnd of Field Season (July 1, 2013)
7th World Congress of Herpetology (August 13, 2012)
Field Season: June 8 (June 8, 2012)
Emerging Baby Turtles (April 23, 2012)
Wildlife Society Western Section (February 2, 2012)
End of Field Season (July 3, 2011)
Turtle Release (June 30. 2011)
Field Season: June 29th (June 29, 2011)
Field Season: June 28th (June 28, 2011)
Field Season: June 23 (June 23, 2011)
Field Season: June 21st (June 21, 2011)
Field Season: Cobb Mountain (June 19, 2011)
Western Section Poster (February 1, 2011)
Turtle Research (December 9, 2010)
A Photo of Me (July 1, 2010)

Additional Turtle Posts By Me

These are posts I’ve written about western pond turtles that are not directly related to my own research. Most of them talk about our headstarting program, which I participated in by collecting, incubating, and hatching eggs, as well as regular data collection about the growth of hatchlings before their release back into the wild.

tumblr_m7e0r2rIFj1r5vtdno2_1280Tiny and Adorable Western Pond Turtles (September 11, 2013)
Turtles! (June 10, 2013)
Grumpyface (September 8, 2012)
Brand New Babies (September 5, 2012)
We Have a Baby! (September 2, 2012)
Soon, Very Soon . . . (August 31, 2012)
Baby Turtle Release (August 20, 2012)
Me and My BB! (August 17th, 2012)
201 (July 18th, 2012)
Baby Turtles (May 8, 2012)
Western Pond Turtle Hatchling (September 15, 2011)
Western Pond Turtle (drawn by me) (September 15, 2011)

 

 

Spatial Analysis in Macroecology

It’s my turn to teach a lesson next week for the stats class I’m taking this semester (everyone has to do one; my topic is analyzing spatial data). This class was supposed to focus on SAS, but so far we’ve done almost nothing in SAS (which is fine with me since I don’t really care that much about learning SAS at this moment; I think JMP will be fine for most of my thesis needs). Especially since it looks like next week I might not do anything with SAS at all; instead, my professor wants me to play around with a program called SAM (Spatial Analysis in Macroecology), so I did a bit of that this evening.

And so far it looks pretty cool! I think I might be able to do some of the things I planned to do in ArcGIS in SAM instead, and a bit more easily. We shall see. It took me all evening to import a data set (for a really stupid reason I should have caught a lot sooner, but OH WELL :D. I thought it was a Mac to PC problem, and part of it was, but mostly it was that I had a numeric value in one of my column labels and apparently the program hates that).

414EA332-4915-4D37-9E48-049A5562699C.jpg

ANYHOODLE there they are. Those are ALL the nests we’ve found for this particular population of turtles in six years of field research. (Including viable nests, nest attempts, and predated nests). This isn’t the data set I’ll use for the meat of my analysis; I’m just going to use these to calculate a mean nest distance value for this population. But this was a good place to start with SAM, I think. Tomorrow, I’ll play around with this a bit more and see what cool stuff I can do. For now though, I like it. And I guess I can put together some sort of presentation about it, assuming this is what my professor decides he wants me to teach. Even if he ends up having me do stuff in JMP (or even SAS), it’s okay – I’m glad to be having the opportunity to learn a bit about SAM. I think it might be really useful to me down the road.

Baby Turtles

These are western pond turtles (Emys marmorata), California’s only native freshwater turtle. They are also tiny and adorable right after they hatch (yes I am a scientist I have data to prove this). 😀 These babies were incubated in their nests (at my field site), and the eggs were collected last week, so they could hatch in the lab. They’ll be raised for either one or two years at one of three local zoos, before being released back into the wild.

End of Field Season

And … as of a few hours ago, my field season for this year has officially ENDED. I didn’t think I was even going to find any turtles today, but then, at the tail end of my last walkthrough, I found this gorgeous lady, JUST after she finished nesting (which is the absolute best time to find them, for a bunch of different reasons). So, YAY Turtle #261! My last turtle of what might be my last official field season on this project. Isn’t she the prettiest princess EVER?

Overall, it was a weird field season. We didn’t find nearly as many nests as in previous years, and we never really had a “peak” – there is usually a week or so when LOADS of turtles are all out on the same days; I think the most we ever had on a single day this year was five. I attribute this mostly to the weather (which alternated between rainy and cold, which they won’t come out to nest in, and EXTREME heat, which they also won’t come out to nest in). But, it was still fun, although I will say I’m glad it’s over. I get a bit tired of camping two or three nights a week.

Turtles!

TURTLES! We found four of them last night. PRECIOUS BABBIES! This one is #248. AND SHE IS THE PRETTIEST PRINCESS IN PRINCESS TOWN! She was really adorable, too. She stuck her head out while we were taking photos, and let me rub under her chin. SO...

TURTLES! We found four of them last night. This one is #248. AND SHE IS THE PRETTIEST PRINCESS IN PRINCESS TOWN! She was really adorable, too. She stuck her head out while we were taking photos.

Don’t know if we’ll see any turtles tonight. Weather is all over the place here; we had a MASSIVE thunderstorm last night, and a bit of rain. They won’t come out to nest unless the ground is dry, so if it rained too much at the field site, tonight will be dead up there. But we’ll see. Either way, TURTLES!!!!!!

Graduate Showcase

My presentation at today’s Graduate Showcase went really well! I’m posting the slides here, in case anyone is interested. It only hits on two of my research questions, and all the stats were removed, as this was geared toward a non-scientific audience. Still, it should give an idea about the focus of my research.