Wild Terrapin Story

[Scott McDaniel]

Scott McDaniel

August 4, 2008 at 1:30 pm #21985

Attachments :Hello everyone, I know it may not be of much interest to some of those here on the east coast but many members here have never seen a terrapin in its natural habitat. I am an avid herper/ wildlife photographer and while I have encountered and gotten half-decent shots of most of the native turtles in Maryland, terrapins have mostly eluded me due to the distance necessary to travel to the larger populations and their general shyness. Many times while crabbing on the Eastern Shore I have seen a quickly disappearing head or quick kick of a hind foot, but never since starting my quest have I been able to get one in my hands to take some closeup photographs. Over the weekend I was able to make it down to the brackish bay waters west of Fenwick Island, DE just outside Ocean City, Maryland. I went by kayak out into the relatively shallow waters in search for my favorite turtle but without success. I traveled across the bay, paddled around several isolated islands with sandy beaches (great nesting spots at least), and ended up meandering through a few estuarine tributaries in search for some sign of terrapin. I headed out quite early in the morning, the habitat was perfect, the waters seemed clean, the areas were teeming with blue crabs, fish, and mollusks. I was pretty disappointed to not see any terrapins despite having the perfect elements all there but at least I had a great time just getting to be out in nature. Just as I paddled back up to the high traffic cove where the rental house was located I lit up with surprise as right in front of me, literally directly in front of the rip-rap behind the house was a huge female diamondback about 50 feet ahead. As expected it dove deeper out of sight once it saw me. I pulled my boat out of the water and was greeted by one of the locals that owned the property next to our rental. He said to me, “better watch out walking around in that water, there are three or four big turtles in there. One of them kept nipping me while I was in the water working on my boat’s propeller. Yeah, actually one of them came up into my yard a few weeks ago and laid eggs.” He wasn’t lying, soon after I went up onto the deck and was able to snap that shot that I attached here once it resurfaced to check me out. It’s not quite what I wanted but it’s something. I was happy to hear of several large females like this in the area and laying eggs at that! Despite my failure to find them in the pristine, protected areas, at least they are adapting to life around these developed marinas. I thought it was a pretty cool story and thought I would share. The summer isn’t over, I will be back down to the shore soon enough to paddle into some other habitats where hopefully I can finally catch some basking. Until then…-Scott McDaniel

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