Suburban Wetlands Offer Turtles A Good Home
In 2009, a team of Australian biologists found that mortality rates of adult eastern long-necked turtles (Chelodina longicollis) were similar in populations living in suburban areas and adjacent nature reserves. At first glance, this result seemed to indicate that suburban sites acted as adequate habitats for this species--a result that is contrary to the findings of the majority of anthropogenic disturbance studies. So, in order to look a bit closer, the researchers performed a second, larger-scale investigation in which they assessed population abundance and demographics of eastern long-necked turtles, evaluated habitat characteristics, and quantified migration rates between the suburban sites and their nearby natural counterparts. read more