One of the prettier terrapins we caught.
The crew spent this past Friday and Saturday on Kiawah Island, South Carolina. We were there to help Michael Dorcas, a professor at Davidson College, sample terrapins in salt marsh streams. Sampling could only happen about an hour before until an hour after low tide, so it wasn't long work, but it sure was hard work. We mostly seine netted, which involves stretching a large net across the stream and dragging it along the river as fast as you can. If done correctly and the stream isn't too deep, the weights on the net will drag along the bottom and the turtles will be forced to swim into a large pocket in the middle of the net. The entire time we were either dragging the nets over mud that could get thigh high or over oyster beds. Sandwich seining seemed to the most effective strategy, which involves two nets along the stream being dragged toward each other. Overall, I believe we caught somewhere between 80 and 90 terrapins! There were no casualties while we were there, but in the past people have been stung by stingrays and cut down to the bone by oysters, which can be razor sharp. However, despite the fact that it was hard work and potentially dangerous, it was blast and I really wish we could have stayed longer!
Unfortunately, I was unable to get any videos or images of us actually doing the seine netting.
Given they were from Walmart, this is what the oysters did to my brand new shoes.
Well I THOUGHT the person with my camera was taking other photos of me, but this is actually the only picture I have of me with a terrapin...
Our friendly neighborhood egret (missing half a toe):
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