Click here for updates on this story
PORTLAND, Ore. (KPTV) — The Oregon Zoo just got a little cuter: 15 baby western pond turtles arrived at the zoo’s conservation lab last week.
The tiny arrivals, which are smaller than a nickel, were collected by the Washington Fish and Wildlife Service from sites in the Columbia Gorge and handed over to Shelly Pettit, the zoo’s senior keeper for reptiles and amphibians.
Due to their size, the hatchlings are extremely vulnerable to predators. To give them a fighting chance, they are collected from the wild and reared in the zoo’s turtle conservation lab.
“Baby turtles are really small when they hatch, so they’re the perfect size for a lot of animals to eat,” said Pettit. “And the biggest problem they have right now are the invasive, or introduced, bullfrogs — they prey on turtle hatchlings right out of the nest.”
The zoo said Pettit and her colleagues will care for the turtles until next spring when they will be large enough to go back into the wild.
Visitors can watch the turtles as they grow inside the zoo’s Nature Exploration Station.
“We keep these little turtles warm, safe and well-fed in the lab,” Pettit said. “As a result, they grow to about the size of a 3-year-old during the nine months that they stay with us.”
Western pond turtles are listed as an endangered species in Washington and a sensitive species in Oregon. The Western Pond Turtle Recovery Project is a collaborative effort by the Oregon Zoo, Woodland Park Zoo, Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Bonneville Power Administration, USDA Forest Service and other partners.
Please note: This content carries a strict local market embargo. If you share the same market as the contributor of this article, you may not use it on any platform.
