Where is Waldo? An Eastern Box Turtle
Who Is Waldo?
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Created By: Thomas Astolfi
Edited By: Juliana Thomas
Designed by: Matthew Tippett
 

The scientific name for a box turtle is:
(Terrapane carolina carolina)

So who really is Waldo? Let me explain a little bit more about who he is and what we are doing with him.

Lake Raleigh Area.

Have you ever read a where's Waldo book? You know how the person you are trying to find is always camouflaged with his surroundings? This is the same for Waldo the turtle. His shell is the color of the forest so he can hide under leaves and rocks and predators will have a harder time finding him. 

sam-with-turtle.jpg

Very recently Sam Settlage (above) found a new Eastern box turtle by the name of Sammy. Sammy was unmarked wich means sam gets full credit for his discovery.

Hello this is Thomas Astolfi from Exploris Middle School. The sixth grade class has joined up with the Centennial Wildlife Center and we have been working with a spectacular species called the Eastern Box Turtle (Terrapane carolina carolina). This species is nicknamed after a box because of its amazing hinge. The hinge allows the Eastern box turtle to fully close his shell to protect himself from predators. But believe it or not, no matter how safe one of these turtles sounds, squezzed inside of their shell, there is one predator a turtle cannot withstand. That predator is a HUMAN. It is a true fact that humans cause a higher mortality rate than any other species in the world that hunts or eats turtles. Cars, lawnmowers, dogs, and weedwackers are all things we use or have in our every day lives that can greatly affect turtle populations. This is why we are joining the fight to save the turtles. We tracked and monitored an Eastern Box turtle named Waldo, who spends his time living near the Lake Raleigh Area. We track him using the well known GPS navigational system but also with a device called a radio telemetry set. This system emits some high pitched beeps, and a needle on the device goes through a scale of 0-10. If the needle goes to 0 in the direction you are pointing the satellite it means he is most likely not that way. If the needle goes to 10 he is most likely in that direction. If it is the same all the way around then you are probably very very close. That is how we track Waldo. Waldo was brought to the Lake raleigh area after being hit by a car and having his head smashed in. Surprisingly he was not killed and came to live a peacful life in the Lake Raleigh area, although there was another turtle that we found that was not as fourtunate. A turtle named Dan-D-Man suffered a much worse fate than Waldo. We found Dan-D-Man in the Lake Raleigh area already, he was tagged and released back into the wild to live a free life. Unfortunately this is not what happened. About a month after Dan-D-Man was released into the wild he was killed by ongoing construction in a part of the forest, sadly his life had met an end. This was a major eye opener for all the sixth graders here at Exploris Middle and we hope to learn more about turtles and how to save them. From now on kids learn how to not only track but how to care for turtles and also how to find new ones. Hope you join the fight to save the turtles.

Please send me comments on any questions or comments!!

  

SAVE THE TURTLES!!!