Flett Creek Hurdles: Girdling the Fertile Turtles
OK. Sort of sorry about this headline. I had a lot of leftover words in my vocabulary after responding to a Tumblr post complaining 'nothing ****ing rhymes with purple'. Thank you, Mike Yates, for your High School Shakespeare classes. Thank you, O English Savant Twin who curses in fluent Elizabethan.
First of all, Flett Creek is a fantastic watershed for the South Puget Trough but humans are the same all over, and it isn't just trash that winds up in the water. Many animals are 'returned to nature' when they no longer suit as pets, even if the nature they're 'returned' to is an alien landscape from their native habitat. Some things jump in there out of their own volition. Much as we'd love to give humans 100% of the direct blame for everything that happens, it would be more accurate to translate some of this as the result of ignorance and misplaced optimism, "I didn't know Fluffy/Fido/Sir Hissyfit would do that." Pet owners throughout time and space have been saying this in varying forms of 'oops' since we started putting ourselves through the schadenfreude of domestication. Other causes of displacement are completely out of our control. Pets escape from natural disasters, or go missing. In all of this I am thinking of my son, who was Kipling's Cat in grade school. "I am the Cat that walks by himself, and all places are alike to me.’
This is but one of the many reasons why you don't put a turtle in your ornamental pond. They have legs. And working reproductive organs.
You know how people get bored with pet pythons once they get big enough to swallow the neighbor's VW in Florida and then drop 'em into the Everglades? Same thing happens here, only it isn't pythons we have to worry about (at least not at this moment). We've a whole plethora of invasive species from African Clawed Frogs to Zebra Mussels. And right now I'm going to focus a little on something that is quite good about surviving in the Puget Trough. A native of the Southeastern-to-Midwestern American States, Trachemys scripta elegans. If you break that down into the comedic disaster of English, this is the "rough-shelled turtle with elegant writing' (referring to the script-like mottling on the shells). This is the Red Eared Slider.
Red Ear Sliders are one of the most aggressive-passive invasive species to the Puget Trough and yes I typed that in the correct order. They are so passive, they are aggressive about it. Their numbers are swelling (besides the appalling influx of pet owners trying to dump Shelly) for very good reasons:
Red Ear Sliders are resilient and resourceful to an obnoxious level. The Junior Woodchuck level of all-around competency in survival. They can lay eggs five times a year if weather is good, and each clutch can be from 2-23 eggs! That's...do the math. That's 10-115 eggs. WA State has a lovely awareness pdf that averages the clutches out to 10-15 (probably a more palatable stat). Plus, let's not forget that in years of plentiful food of a high nutritive output, birthrates go up.
Translated into an equation (Hi, Mr. Parnell), what you've got is this if the clutch is kept to, say, 10 fertile eggs that survive hatching, said turtle lays eggs at around the ripe old age of 2, and lives 20 years in the wild (they live a LOT longer in captivity or static habitats, oh, boy, do they ever. Your grandkids will inherit the earth you created).
Now, let's imagine Fibonacci decided to do his crazy equations on turtles instead of rabbits. On second thought, let's not. If you water down the stats to the most insultingly basic form you're looking at 1,000 eggs in 20 years per breeding turtle, and that doesn't include the baby turtles laid by its children, grand-children, great-grands, etc.
They can wander like a lost caravan for miles and readily colonize a wide variety of water, including the brackish waters of the Sound! Even Florida has to deal with these little things, and let me tell you, that is quite an act. Florida has high-quality apex predators running around, and some of them are actually natives, like cougars, Alligator mississippiensis (American Alligator), or our native crocodile the Crocodylus acutus--yes, Virginia, the USA has crocodiles. Get with the memo, read up on some Carl Hiassen, and do not pass go, to not swim in certain parts of South Florida. RES turtles are possibly the only wildlife ignored by the invasive pythons.
Other fine diners of the RES are raccoons, full-blown freaky carnival show catfish (don't get me started on something big as a VW), coyotes, foxes, and otters. Give them the choice and the eggs will be more appealing. They're a simpler bet. I salute them, because I read Gary Paulsen's THE HATCHET and the author tells us with absolute authority that in his search for authenticity, he tried a raw turtle egg. I recall one of the more outstanding flavors he was able to describe was 'oil.' Go read the book. Reptile eggs may not particularly appeal to our shaved-monkey DNA because in a long-lost book I once had, a white woman living in the Oz Outback said of being served baked crocodile eggs, you take what you are offered, eat it, and don't ask for seconds. Or, go here for an assessment. P.S. that last source is a bit on the whiny side as I've merrily eaten guinea fowl eggs, dove eggs, quail eggs, duck eggs...they taste great and I'd love to eat seagull eggs someday...well, legally. Being an adult is hard.
On the other side of the food web you can see why there are so many red ear sliders in Puget Sound. They. Eat. Anything. The adults prefer their vegetables more than protein, but sliders are capable of gulping down insects, mollusks, algae, fish, frogs, frog eggs, tadpoles, baby snakes...this is not good. What we've got is an animal that will eat anything it can fit into its mouth (a lot smarter than pythons in that regard), and it doesn't have nearly enough predators willing to mess with it. I have long suspected that the native or beenhereawhile wildlife simply doesn't know what to do with these sliders. I have yet to meet any watery food source that an otter couldn't utterly destroy, and yet...these jerks wallowing in the southeast corner of Pond #4 of Flett Creek appear to exist in un-harassed smug glory.
...I've milked goats that gave me fewer problems, son.
I first 'met' the slider as an empty shell in Andy's classroom. Later we field tripped our way to Lake Waughop under Tom Lynott and despite the chill there were several of them basking in the air. I drew it. That's a leech on its right 'shoulder'.
Below: This RES was photographed today (April 20) during a Mental Health Break at Wright's Parkin Old Tacoma. I'm told by a frequent walker there are at least 4 of them at any one time--as well as a lot of goldfish that enjoy a short and interesting life once the herons come to visit. The scutes are molting, which looks alarming as all get out. You can see the brilliant red stripe behind the eye.
As soon as we found this one, a second popped up on the other side of the bridge, stretching out her left leg:
Below: The Flett's very own Pond #4 Cosplayer for Enya's breakout Orinoco Flow... Sail Away, Sail Away...how much water under the Slider since 2001??
All righty then, this is where I get to rant and rave against my questionable powers of observation. Because yesterday Dr. Faust was laboring like a Gandy Dancer under the future site of the upcoming Restored Nature Awareness Sign (it went up today) and he sent me a gloatext letting me know he beat me to spotting the native Western Buttercup blooms.
Sunburned, tired, dehydrated and feeling very competitive, I texted back "I'll see your buttercups and raise you 8 turtles."
Because:
Oh, and for the record, some of these turtles may be one of out increasingly-disenfranchised native turtles, but the overwhelming majority are red ear sliders. All of them (as far as I know) are Emydidae, which is the family of freshwater turtles/tortoises. The colloquial, 'pond turtles' will do nicely.
Above: These two are physically different and may be our native turtles, but 2 out of 11 is a terrible, terrible ratio.
Below: You...beautiful, beautiful aliens.
Now this is why you take home your photos and look at them on the computer screen before you erase anything.
Because when you look at the slightly pulled back image...you're going to see THIS.
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Now. Take a look at this photo here, and compare it to the photo to the one posted directly below. Do you see the turtle that showed up for one but not the other?
Let's give a shout out to the-then Marine Biology instructor at TCC, Marina. She made us sit through an entire package of Orca ID by analyzing photographs of fins slicing through the water. Between that and Simon's Cat Games, the pattern recognition made me notice things like THIS:
How many of these were pets? They are a legal pet for Washington State...as long as they are equal to or over 4 inches in length.
Um...yeah. Really. The fiction writer is telling you this is not made up. Under 4 inches, you have something illegal. Because it carries salmonella. And parasites. Constructions like this are why we have horror stories like Oregon euthanizing ~1,100 red ear sliders in 2008. Only two, TWO pet owners/sellers were responsible for the majority of these numbers.
What in the world can I say about this? If it were the reverse (anything under 4" in length) it still wouldn't make enough sense to keep them as pets. Why is it, I wonder, animals deemed to be exotic pets aren't sterilized? Gosh, yes, that would be expensive, drive up the price of the pet...but how much are we paying to eradicate these hornswoggling rascals? For that matter, what's the protocol if you find red ear sliders?
Well...don't take it home. Wear gloves. Call Fish and Wildlife. Call the local animal rescue facility. In some states it is illegal to return a captured invasive species back into its environment (I firmly believe if you admit to walking outside your house you should have these numbers on speed-dial (plus the Sheriff's office if you find a dead or injured raptor).
It is a little circular that countries who have imported the RES for the meat market are now invaded with them and dealing with the extra consequences of their native wildlife suffering. As far as eating them, well...be prepared for buying them in an exotic meat market (yeah, I KNOW that's just wrong, but don't expect too much logic in a country that still clutches the Imperial Standard like Mater's pearls). A blogger shared the experience of buying a package of turtle meat and making what we're assured is an astoundingly good bowl of turtle soup from it. Be prepared for strange sentences, such as vegan chicken broth in the ingredients list, and if you are a responsible parent, you will not let your children read the comments that follows below the article. Also, the claws are still attached to the feet so the photos are a little...surprising.
That's the positive scale of eating RES. On the other side is a post from theturtlehub and they tried their best to be fair and balanced. Exhibit A explains the nutritional value of RES with little to no fat, trace elements, minerals, and the fact that you'll never, ever adversely affect the population even if you went Diamond Jim Brady on them and ate 40 a day for the rest of your life. Exhibit B is...reasons why you shouldn't eat turtle, which translates to 'do not touch this thing with a barge pole.' The summary is this:
Speaking of, Diamond Jim Brady ate rather like a RES himself--whatever he wanted, and what he could fit in his mouth. He ate green turtle soup and terrapin multiple times a week probably because it tasted good and with a certainty because it was expensive.***
Grimness aside, there is a huge industry and growing job market with invasive species. As in...eradication and removal. Is it awful? It can be. It really does depend on the job. Cleaning out a pond choked with aggressive plants may seem a lot less stressful than, say, collecting and euthanizing armloads of nutria, but everyone has their personal boundaries and it is a good idea to know what they are. Indeed.com is full of jobs across the country working with invasive/exotic animals, and LinkedIn has a global database for volunteers looking to do the same.
What you should not do is be ignorant of the field. Not every species under eradication programs is non-native....and it wasn't that long ago that any species' status as 'noxious' or 'useful' was based solely on its value as a quantifiable market factor. That's why there was all that focus on killing off the buffalo--it was equity for the Native Americans. It was why the English government destroyed as many oaks as they could find in Ireland. Etc., etc.
RES, regretfully, is only at its most vulnerable when it is a clutch of eggs, or very young turtles. Petco in 2012 accepted RES 'any size', in an attempt to get the salmonella out of the public, but many people weren't asking what happened once they handed them over. The company sent the turtles to a company in Florida where they became part of an international market for RES. So...NIMBY.
You'll hear NIMBY in Kathy Smith's classes a lot. Often in context to toxic waste or examples like the wild goats on the wrong side of the Cascades. It means Not In My Back Yard. It is what happens when you find a situation intolerable, and you won't put up with it...but too often you can only protest what is happening in your own little corner of the world.
What then, you may wonder. A re-thinking? The job market is changing as the concerns gain voice and one of the most timely of voices is for the rights of animals who, if they cannot live, do not deserve pain and suffering. In the recent case of removing Mountain Goats in Olympia, part of the solution was not to kill them, but to return them to their native Cascades where their numbers were concerningly low. Instead of the 'point and shoot' methods in the past, jobs have new titles with new connotations. Here is a small sample:
Habitat Improvement = focuses on the end results. What's a great place for native species isn't always a great place for non-native invasive species.
Climate Study = We need to know what we're working with. Thanks to current efforts, we already know that many of our Puget Sound species have been through this gamut before--did you know our Snowshoe Hares stay brown year round as a response to the loss of snowy white winters?
Species Protection and Habitat Development = reminds employees of the immediate needs of the post, with the implication that this job requires a broad agency.
Invasive Species Inspector = often seen in jobs for watercraft and port (freshwater, marine, and brackish). Other applications are products-incoming at airports, depots, and delivery stops.
Environmental Law = studying past history of legal precedent in this country and in others, plus the results/ramifications. Quite necessary when determining BMPs (Best Management Practices)
Stream Crew Intern = encompasses the work done to log data on native and non-native species, as well as encourage conditions that would support the former and discourage the latter. WACC does a brickton of this sort of work.
Site Steward = Same as above, only focused on a geographical point.
Invasive Species Strike Member = Well. Wow.
This ultimately boils down to education. Florida took a big step in staying No More Pythons this year, but what can other states do? I love holly trees, but I love a Bigleaf Maple forest a lot more. I needed to be told they were not native to Puget Sound. Heck, just having a Native Plant popsicle stick in every proper pot in your local nursery could make a huge difference in consumer awareness.
This is Earth Week. While the problem of the RES is not a simple one, acknowledging the past, present, and future of our relationship with the environment is the proper tactic. Without it we are blind to our own capacity to make changes. A new level of environmental literacy is required.
____
*Liberal Health Tip: never vote into office a sheriff who sees a human leg-bone with shoe still attached as 'somebody's dog'. If you do, it's gonna be up to you to report anything suspiciously ghastly to the State Police.
**Carl Hiassen is a god and Invasive Species are how he demonstrates his disapproval of us shaved monkeys.
*** You know what, just don't research the recipes followed by those fine old establishments Diamond Jim frequented. It was common for the poor turtles and terrapins to be boiled alive and a sauce made of the eggs found within them. These recipes were still on the books in the 1940's. I do not approve.