2023 Turtles Kingston Annual Report

Thanks to our Turtles Kingston Coordinators and the support of our community, we had a successful year!

This year is coming to a close and before it does, we wanted to look back on Turtles Kingston’s accomplishments over the 2023 turtle season. Below you will find a detailed summary of what we accomplished in all our programs: education program, nesting program, trauma program, science program, advocacy program, and more. But, first to summarize…

The Turtles Kingston Team and Organization

There have been lots of changes to Turtles Kingston over the last 2 years. Our Director Tara Bauer took over in September 2021 and since then she has expanded the coordinator team to include 8 additional positions: Assistant Director, Trauma Program Coordinator, Nesting Program Coordinator, Science Coordinator, Education Coordinator, Information Coordinator, Design Coordinator, and Advocacy Coordinator.

At the beginning of the year each position was filled with Adrian Jacklin, our Trauma Coordinator, also taking on the role of Assistant Director. As the year progressed we had several new faces join the team while others left.

One of the coordinators to leave us was James Ostler. We want to give James a big thank you for his years of dedication to Turtles Kingston as a volunteer and the Nesting Program Coordinator. James continues to support turtles and Turtles Kingston but has left his position with the team.

We also said good-bye to our Advocacy Coordinator Abbey and Education Coordinator Aly. Pamela joined the team in March as our new Education Coordinator and Anju joined as our Design Coordinator. The final change to the team was the addition of Rachel as our Information Coordinator to take over the Turtles Kingston blog from Nikki who left in Janurary 2023.

Behind the scenes we have been working on advancing Turtles Kingston into an official not-for-profit or charity. This started with obtaining insurance, joining the Ontario Nature - Nature Network, and working with Queen’s Law clinic to start the process for registering Turtles Kingston as a not-for-profit or charity.

Education Program

Our Education Team composed of Aly/Pamela, Rachel, and Anju did an amazing job this year with increasing our reach, engaging the community, and improving our knowledge of turtles! Let’s break down what they accomplished.

Outreach and Knowledge Dissemination

This was our second year offering our Turtle Trials activity. Thanks to our collaboration with blue marble learning scene, who facilitates the activity for us, more than 250 future turtle warriors were trained over the course of 14 Turtle Trial activity offerings. The Turtle Trials activity was offered all over the region from Tweed to Brockville and for Kindergarten classes to library groups and even at camps!

In addition to our Turtle Trials activity, we also facilitated 3 youth/adult focused turtle programs to a graduate class at RMC, the La Salle Earth Club, and to construction companies (Doornekamp and City Flats) planning work near our downtown turtle monitoring site. Turtle knowledge was also shared at 3 community events: at our second annual Turtle Awareness Day held on June 3, during the Dive Against Debris event on June 10, and during Nature Day on October 14.

The second Turtle Awareness Day was a big success with many visitors stoping by Confederation Basin to enjoy activities, demonstrations, music, and stories. The community art projects completed during the event were displayed at the Marine Museum of the Great Lakes Kingston during the summer.

Turtle knowledge was also disseminated through our turtles blog and 3 print media articles: Kingston Life Magazine, Frontenac News, and Profile Kingston. In 2023, we published 6 blogs on various topics from road mitigation, nest protection, and turtle eggs to poaching and the importance of wetlands. Our most popular blog post continued to be about how turtles survive the winter (published in 2022) which received over 2000 views this year. From this years blog posts our “Everything you need to know about protecting turtle nests” post was the most popular receiving over 300 views.

One of our goals at Turtles Kingston is to provide knowledge to help individuals take action to protect turtles in their area. As a result, we are working towards creating a catalog of informational handouts that can be downloaded for free from our website. This year we were able to create 2 new handouts about turtles and construction and how to move a turtle to add to our collection. We also created a location specific informational handout for a local marina who get lots of turtles nesting on their property. We don’t have our own turtle identification sheet (yet) but were able to order 30 copies of a Ontario local Reptile Handbook which we sold from our Turtle Store.

Social Media

Never attempt to straddle a turtle on the road with your vehicle. Here is a few reasons why:
The "Common Snapping Turtle" native to Ontario, cannot retract into its shell like all other turtles, as a means of 'protection'. Instead, the turtle will defend itself by rearing up, extending their long neck and lunge to snap as it is their only means of defence.

The "Common Snapping Turtle" is likely to get caught in the undercarriage of the vehicle, resulting in rolling them over causing death or extensive injuries such as a cracked carapace or plastron, broken jaw, limb and head trauma.

Smaller turtles like the "Midland Painted Turtle", will often stay in the middle of the road like a sitting target or 'scurry' across the road. Both often result in life threatening injuries or their demise.

Please stop if it's safe to do so, and help the turtle cross the road in the direction it is going.

Second only to habitat loss, road mortality is the biggest reason for the decline in their turtle populations.

EDIT:

A couple additional points for questions in the comments

if it is not safe for you and others to stop or avoid straddling a turtle then of course the best option is to straddle. But in cases where this can be avoided please consider the damage that straddling a turtle can cause to the turtle

Common snapping turtles found in Ontario cannot break broom sticks or take off your finger. They have a bite capacity less than a human and only snap to try and scare you away since they cannot pull fully into their shell.

Learn more about myths surrounding snapping turtles: https://www.turtleskingston.com/.../dispelling-myths...

Of course it is always best to be aware of their ability to snap and thus help them in a way that is safe for you and keeps your hands clear of their mouth.

https://www.turtleskingston.com/moving-a-turtle

Always move a turtle in the direction it was heading. We like to say turtles are stubborn. If you move them the opposite direction they were heading then they will just turn around and try to cross the road again - meaning you didn’t actually help them. Yes where they are going may not be safe but they are headed somewhere specific and will encounter many human made threats along the way. What we can help with is the immediate danger they face with the road we find them on.

Turtles Kingston started primarily as a Facebook community that quickly grew to ~4000 people. Today we have a Facebook and Instagram community of 5,352 (403 new followers) and 790 (176 new followers) respectively. Our educational reach via social media goes beyond our followers and this year we were able to reach 1,438,161 people via Facebook, 2,573 via Instagram, and 8,600 via our website (turtleskingston.com). Our massive reach via Facebook was in large part to a viral post about straddling turtles at the end of June. Overall, thanks to our Education Coordinators Aly and Pamela, we had 498 educational posts on Facebook and 271 posts on Instagram (plus 155 stories).

Our viral Facebook post reached a total of 1,138 people, received 12,252 reactions, 1,140 comments, and 11,964 shares. Unfortunately, as with most viral posts, there were positive and negative comments. We attempted to address and respond to some of the negative comments to further raise awareness and try to counter the negative image snapping turtles have.

Website: Our website had a total of 10,000 visits, primarily in May through July, with 57% of those visits from search results, 13% from socials, and 29% directly. Although we are a Kingston, Ontario our website reach is wider with 34% of visits from the USA as well as some visitors from India, Australia, UK, Germany, Philippines, Mexico, and others. 55% of visits were from Canada with the majority from Ontario (81%).

Answering questions: Over 2023, we helped answer questions from the community about turtles. In total we answered 155 inquires (112 from social media messages and 43 from emails)

Finally, our Turtles Kingston Membership grew from 125 to 173 members. These members receive monthly emails about turtles and opportunities to volunteer.

Nesting Program

It was another successful year for the Nest Protection Program. In 2023, our Nesting Program Coordinator James was able to coordinate the construction of 81 nest protectors with the help of our returning two amazing volunteers, Carl and Katie, as well as Teaching Students from Queen’s University who built 50 of our nest protectors!

Supplies for these 81 nest protectors were purchased with funds from the sale of nest protectors in 2022 as well as a generous donation of lumber (20 2x4s) from Glen Supply Co. Ltd..

This year’s nest protectors supported a new sign to help raise awareness in the community where nest protectors are placed.

Sales of our newly constructed nest protectors were supported by Potter’s Nursery who were able to distribute 41 nest protectors from their location. Sales were also made via our new Turtle Store where members of the public can purchase nest protectors, lawn signs, bumper stickers, and car magnets. In total, we distributed 57 nest protectors, 15 of which were used in our monitoring program to protect turtle nests in downtown Kingston. An additional 21 previously used nest boxes were also added to the downtown monitoring program stock to replace nest boxes that had been damaged over winter.

Nest protectors were sold at cost for the materials ($25 each) and funds from this program ($970) will continue to support the construction of more nest protectors in 2024. Our aim next year will be to construct 22 new nesting boxes as we have 28 left over from those built this year, in addition to 3 previously used boxes that will head to our monitoring site.

Trauma Program

2023 marked the second year the Turtles Kingston Turtle Trauma Response Program was relaunched after the pandemic hiatus. This year, under the organization of Adrian Jacklin, 28 injured turtles were brought to Sandy Pines Wildlife Centre by 9 of our 45 Volunteer Drivers: 3 Northern Map turtles, 2 Midland Painted turtles, 4 Common Snapping turtles, 1 Blanding’s turtle, and 18 unidentified turtles. The first injured turtle was brought into the program on May 8 and the last turtle was brought in on October 6. Our busiest day for injured turtles was June 2 with 3 intakes to the program.

*Rehabilitated Midland Painted turtle being released into its natural habitat*

Less turtles were brought into the trauma program in 2023 compared to 2022. We hope this means less turtles are being injured on roads. One possible factor for the decrease is the opening of the Perth Veterinary clinic as a holding station for the Ontario Turtle Conservation Centre. Some turtles that would have likely come into our program may have been directed there instead.

The Turtle Trauma Response Program is supported by volunteer veterinary clinics who act as temporary holding stations for injured turtles, while we find and dispatch volunteer drivers. This year two new clinics were added to the program: Barriefield Animal Hospital and Sydenham Veterinary Services. In total, 8 veterinary clinics support the trauma program and all 8 received at least one turtle this year.

As always, this program would not be possible without the amazing work that is done at Sandy Pines Wildlife Centre to rehabilitate the turtles we bring them! We were even lucky enough to help release some rehabilitated turtles back into the wild this year.

Science Program

This is the second year for our turtle monitoring program, headed by our Science Coordinator Lesley Rudy, and the first official year for our nest rescue program.

Our Turtle Monitoring Program occurs at a downtown Kingston site and was a big success in 2023. This year we were able to cover 76 turtle nests thanks to 10 trained volunteers. An additional 15 nests were covered thanks to local businesses within our study area. That’s a total of 127 turtle nests protected through the monitoring program in 2022 and 2023.

Volunteer turtle monitors were asked to walk the site at least once a week for 2 hours during June. Overall our volunteers contributed 140.5 hours of monitoring over 68 shifts. During these monitoring shifts 222 turtle sightings were recorded of at least 72 unique turtles (identified from scientific study markings).

The monitoring program was not without challenges. This year we experienced a challenge of nest predation. Nest protectors are meant to stop predation, but some determined predator was able to predate a handful of protected nests this year. This will need to be investigated further and more care given to ensure protected nests are safe from predators in the future. In addition, we were saddened to find 3 injured / killed nesting female turtles that had been struck by vehicles in the study site.

Thanks to Adam Cushen for his volunteering and really awesome photos of Northern Map turtles in our monitoring site.

The turtle Nest Rescue Program was officially launched this year with the goal to provide information and resources for the community to access if they believed a turtle nest was at risk of being destroyed. The program starts with individuals contacting Turtles Kingston with their concerns. If the turtle nest is determine to be in a location where it is likely to be destroyed and the threatening activities cannot be halted, Turtles Kingston would work with the individual and landowner to obtain appropriate permits for extracting the nest for incubation at Sandy Pines Wildlife Centre.

In 2023, we had 6 inquiries to have turtle nests rescued. Through conversations with those who contacted us and from understanding the situation it was determined that none of the turtle nests in question needed to be rescued. The nests were either not at risk of being destroyed (e.g., occasionally driving over a nest will not destroy) or were able to be left undisturbed by threatening activities (e.g., maintenance/use of a local ball-diamond was suspended, road construction was adjusted, and gardening mulch pipes left untouched).

We were very thankful to the City of Kingston for their quick response and the adjustments made to accommodate turtle nests in a local ball park. From communication with the city, we were informed that it is their standard practice to stop grading activities and potentially redirect use of public spaces in order to protect turtle nests.

Advocacy Program

Compared to 2022, with several big and controversial development proposals, we had a slower 2023, which allowed us to start focusing on new projects and initiatives. Our main new advocacy initiative is related to turtle crossing road signage. Each year we get several inquiries as to how community members can get road signage in different locations around Kingston and Frontenac. Road signs are the responsibility of the road owner, which is often the Municipality or Township. As such, we reached out to the City of Kingston and the Township of South Frontenac to inquire as to their process for installing new road signs for wildlife crossings.

The response to our inquiry resulted in several meetings with the City of Kingston to help them develop an internal procedure for prioritizing requests for turtle crossing signs, what road signs should look like, and identifying 5 locations considered to be a priority to Turtles Kingston. During a follow up meeting in November, staff at the City of Kingston shared their new wildlife crossing sign procedure and informed us that they would be moving forward with installing new turtle crossing signage at 4 locations around the city and upgrading the crossing signage at a 5th location to include flashing lights.

We also got a response from the Township of South Frontenac who indicated they would consider a list of locations if we provided it to them. As such, we launched our road signage community form to get input from those in South Frontenac as to where they believe turtle crossing signs should be. This form received 14 responses, the locations of which we will investigate next year and submit a list of proposed locations to the Township for review.

The advocacy projects we were busy with in 2022 were fairly quiet this year. On one project from 2022, we did get the opportunity to provide input on a procedure for turtle monitoring being conducted as part of the Kingston Inner Harbour Sediment Management plan. The turtle monitoring is being completed to get a better idea of the extent of the turtle overwintering habitat in the Kingston Inner Harbour in order to support the Detailed Impact Assessment for that project. After reviewing their protocol, we had several questions and considerations that we thought were adequately addressed.

In 2023, we continued or started advocacy work related to several construction projects. At 9 North St. we pushed again for construction fencing changes to better protect local turtles nesting in the area and we were happy to see permanent fencing installed that addressed the majority of our concerns. At 279 Wellington St. our Science Coordinator Lesley spoke at a City of Kingston planning committee meeting to raise our concerns for turtles at the proposed development site and to push for consideration of turtles prior to and during construction activities. At 10 Cataraqui St. we were approached by City Flats who were trying to better understand how development on their site “can not only be compatible but hopefully encourage turtle wellbeing in and around the area”. As a result of their inquiries we met several times and conducted an educational session at the site for both City Flats and Doornekamp employees.

Finally, we were recently approached by City of Kingston staff to help with their vision to have internal procedures to help them better consider wildlife, including turtles, during construction projects. We are thankful to the City of Kingston for initiating this project and considering turtle wellbeing when construction and maintenance occur within the city.

Other Successes!

We have many programs at Turtles Kingston, but there are even more things we do that don’t fall neatly into one of these programs. Some of these other accomplishments from 2023 include: 58 submissions to our Road Observations form; 37 orders from our Turtle Store; started accepting donations; completed our 2nd annual silent auction fundraiser; and working with the Queens Law Clinic to officially register Turtles Kingston as an organization.

Again in 2023, we collected turtle observations from those within the community to help us get an understanding of where turtles are on roads within the community. This community science initiative is meant to help us target our next advocacy efforts, provide evidence to support our advocacy efforts, and in general help us understand the turtle populations within our community. This year we received 58 submissions from our website. Of these submissions, 27 were alive, 7 dead, and 24 were nesting, 13 turtles were helped across the road, and 4 nests were protected. Each of the 5 turtle species found in the Kingston area, with the exception of Eastern Musk turtles, were observed and reported on our form.

*Thank you to Rachel (our Information Coordinator for providing her art work for our new greeting cards)*

Through our Turtle Store we offer resources to help people protect and learn about turtles including bumper stickers (also available from a variety of local shops for FREE), turtle crossing lawn signs, turtle nest protectors, car magnets (NEW), reptile handbooks (NEW), and greeting cards (NEW). In 2023, we had 37 orders that contained 72 items: 9 lawn signs, 8 packs of bumper stickers, 1 nest protector, 30 car magnets, 12 handbooks, 12 packs of greeting cards.

Reptile handbooks were a special offer in 2023. We placed an order for 30 books with the author based on preorders from the community. Although 12 books were sold via the Turtle Store, the rest were part of the preorder, used as gifts, or part of the silent auction.

A big end of the year project was our second annual silent auction fundraiser that was hosted December 8-10 on Facebook. We had 100 items in our auction and made $2075. Thanks to our donors: Farber Family, Dr C. Tessa Clarke, Ahoy Rentals, Allerglee, Aria Leigh Boutique, Art by A Swirski, blue marble learning scene, Bread and Butter bakery, Crock a Doodle, Capturing Moments with Courtney, Improbable Escapes, James Ostler, Eco-Kare International, Kingston Forest and Nature School, Lichen Fairytales, Lily Mooncat Jewelry, Meaningful Handmade Gifts, OOAK, Outlaw Heart Creations, Rare on Earth, Shelley Wellwood, Tara Bauer, Shiva’s Delight, Thai925, Tula Cafe, and Wilton Cheese Factory.

Financial support for Turtles Kingston is found through the offering of our Turtle Trials activity donations and grants. In 2023, we made $130 from the offering of Turtle Trials activities via blue marble learning scene where we get $10 per activity facilitated. Donations were a major part of our financials this year as we received $691.90 in donations via our new donor box platform and $193.70 via other donation methods. In addition we received $360 from Daughters General Store and the Coffee Plant for their annual turtle fundraiser. We also received an in-kind donation of lumber from Glen Supply to support our nest protection program. In 2023, we did not apply or receive any grants. This was primarily due to a lack of volunteer time to find and apply for these opportunities.

Being a fully volunteer organization, Turtles Kingston does not have much of a budget, however, the donations and funds received (as outlined above) were supplemented by the sale of items in our turtle store, totalling ~$1,056.

Thank you to everyone who supported our efforts this year, for everyone who helped a turtle cross a road, for everyone who supports our Turtles Kingston bumper stickers and car magnets, and to all the turtle warriors out there! We could not do any of this without you.