{"id":7051,"date":"2021-10-27T12:07:52","date_gmt":"2021-10-27T17:07:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin-new\/?post_type=campus_story&p=7051"},"modified":"2021-10-27T12:07:52","modified_gmt":"2021-10-27T17:07:52","slug":"uw-whitewater-students-track-blandings-turtles-for-research-and-better-conservation-practices","status":"publish","type":"campus_story","link":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/story\/uw-whitewater-students-track-blandings-turtles-for-research-and-better-conservation-practices\/","title":{"rendered":"UW-Whitewater students track Blanding\u2019s turtles for research and better conservation practices"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Photo
Blanding’s turtle hatchlings like these were hatched in captivity and released in a Rock County marsh as part of a multi-year study involving UW-Whitewater students of a conservation practice called \u201cheadstarting.\u201d (UW-Whitewater photo\/Craig Schreiner)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

UW-Whitewater students Nick Rudolph and Lisa Mitchem start their day at a reclaimed marsh in Rock County. They unpack research equipment from their car and don fishing waders. Standing in shallow water are great blue herons and egrets trying to be incognito among the cattails.<\/p>\n

This was an outdoor laboratory for Mitchem and Rudolph in 2014. Other undergraduate student researchers followed them in a multi-year, multi-state project led in part by Professor of Biology Joshua Kapfer. Along with graduate students and faculty from Northern Illinois University, they tracked Blanding\u2019s turtle hatchlings to find out how well a conservation practice called \u201cheadstarting\u201d improves hatchling survival. Their results were published in a June edition of the\u00a0Journal of Herpetology<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The shy, yellow-flecked Blanding\u2019s turtle is designated as a species of special concern by the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources and is at risk across the Midwest due to the loss of its habitat. Raccoon populations rise where humans move in, and raccoons love to eat turtle eggs and soft newborns.<\/p>\n

Kapfer and his students located nests, identified turtles that were about to lay eggs, collected eggs and hatched the eggs in captivity. The tiny hatchlings were fitted with chip-sized transmitters and released. Their NIU counterparts, working at sites west of Chicago and near Lake Michigan, deployed cages designed to keep out predators while allowing the new hatchlings to leave on their own.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe wanted to know about headstarting and what happens to these turtles after they are released,\u201d said Kapfer, noting that field research on headstarted turtles can lead to a better application of conservation practices, efficient uses of time and funding, and more Blanding\u2019s turtles.<\/p>\n

Their results showed that recently hatched turtles survive in greater numbers than Kapfer expected.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur original thought was that perhaps hatchlings were just as vulnerable as eggs,\u201d said Kapfer. \u201cOur work supports that hatchlings have pretty high survival. That is, they don\u2019t get gobbled up right away.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kapfer attributes the research gap to the difficulty in studying tiny, tiny turtles. Carrying hand-held antennas and trekking through the muck, Kapfer\u2019s students created a data picture of the movements and survival of the turtles they\u2019d headstarted.<\/p>\n

\u201cTracking turtles through wetland is very, very challenging work,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s physically demanding, mentally demanding. You have to be able to think under duress when you\u2019re all hot and sweaty, covered with bugs and pushing through a wetland. You have to be able to make decisions.\u201d<\/p>\n

Students met landowners whose consent was needed when turtles crossed property lines. All of the work was done on private land with consent from owners.<\/p>\n

Kapfer credited the research funding through the UW-Whitewater SURF program, Undergraduate Research Funds and the Provost’s Office with making summer research possible. With the help of these funds, students can be headstarting their own future careers with relevant summer jobs, he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cA huge goal of mine is not only to teach them, but to teach them how to be scientists,\u201d he said. \u201cThat really is true across the board in the\u00a0biology department<\/a>. We\u2019ve been very good at conducting real research that ultimately ends in students presenting at professional meetings or ultimately being co-authors on peer-reviewed publications.\u201d<\/p>\n

The alumni who tracked Blanding\u2019s turtles through the marsh are excelling as teachers, consultants and graduate researchers. In May, Mitchem graduated with a doctorate from the University of Virginia. She said undergraduate research helped her see that a desire to study biology could be turned into a career as a scientist.<\/p>\n

\u201cGoing into undergrad, I knew I wanted to study biology,\u201d said Mitchem. \u201cBut I never imagined that a person could make a living by tracking turtles and asking cool questions about wildlife. My decision to go to grad school was definitely influenced by my experiences in research as an undergrad.\u201d<\/p>\n

Upon graduating from college, Karl Rutzen (\u201916) was hired to teach at West Allis Central High School near Milwaukee. At various times, Rutzen has taught biology, physical science and chemistry.<\/p>\n

\u201cRecently, we have started a move to more project-based learning,\u201d said Rutzen. \u201cThe (Blanding\u2019s turtle) project helped me realize that we need to learn more about all of the species around us, so I try to encourage all of the students I work with to be curious and keep asking why.”<\/p>\n

Andrew Ibach and Joseph Mozuch, who are also former undergraduate researchers on the project, are working on graduate degrees at the University of Kentucky and at UW-Madison, respectively. Rudolph has worked at the DNR and in consulting, said Kapfer.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the end of the day,\u201d Kapfer said using a favorite phrase, \u201cWe want to prepare students for the next level.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n
\"Photo
UW-Whitewater students Nick Rudolph, left, and Lisa Mitchem search for radio signals from headstarted Blanding’s turtles fitted with transmitters. Dr. Joshua Kapfer, an assistant professor in the UWW Department of Biological Science describes the study: “Headstarting (rearing of eggs\/juveniles in captivity to reduce predation rates) is a conservation tool frequently employed for turtles. Presumably, this technique increases turtle size, which makes them more difficult for predators to consume. However, limited research has assessed the effectiveness of this tool and the behavior of headstarted Blanding\u00eds turtles post-release. Our goal was to obtain this information by tracking turtle movements, habitat selection and assessing survival.” (UW-Whitewater Photo\/Craig Schreiner)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

UW-Whitewater students Nick Rudolph and Lisa Mitchem start their day at a reclaimed marsh in Rock County. They unpack research equipment from their car and don fishing waders. Standing in shallow water are great blue herons and egrets trying to be incognito among the cattails. This was an outdoor laboratory for Mitchem and Rudolph in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":7053,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","institution":[84],"story_category":[],"class_list":["post-7051","campus_story","type-campus_story","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","institution-uw-whitewater"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/campus_story\/7051","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/campus_story"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/campus_story"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7051"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7053"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7051"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"institution","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/institution?post=7051"},{"taxonomy":"story_category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/story_category?post=7051"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}