After a little rain – no more than 1/10th of inch; not the answer to
the prolonged dry spell – on the morning of 29 July I searched again
the edge habitats I have found to be so favored by wood turtles of
such a morning over the years (24, I think, in this area), but saw
none. I looked in on all known nesting terrain, finding no sign of
nest predation, which boded well for upcoming wanderings in hopes o
encounters with nest-to-water journeying hatchlings. This has been a
key feature of my turtle seasons for some years now, something that
draws me out there even in the face of disheartening realities I have
often enumerated (in FOLLOWING…, etc.). And on the 31st, after a
chill night (49F at 5:45AM) I returned to walk the edge habitats
again, at 9 o’clock, with the air temperature at 56F. The tendency of
wood turtles to move into spaces of sunlight within their heavy cover
for a period of warming-up after a cold(ish) night raises the odds of
having sightings. And they are in one visible place – though often yet
quite cryptic, even for basking – for a comparatively extended period
of time. I think back to the one I encountered at the end of my
previous search, who was crossing that Deer Descent as I made my down
it; and how it is that these intersections of time and space lead to
observations. A minute or two earlier or later on my part or the
turtle’s, a shift in either of our paths of a matter of a couple of
footsteps, and the moment of meeting would have been missed. (The
turtle would not have minded.) I live for these intersections, never
seem to be able to stop wondering about them, at them. This beyond
turtle as well; but with “moment with turtle” there has always (since
age 8, at any rate) been a key (to what lock?). I can only hope I am
lucky enough to find places where such moments can be encountered
within a greater untrammeled landscape space.

That last morning in July yielded two finds, and they were key ones.
Or perhaps I think that of any wood, spotted or Blanding’s turtle
encounter. This in large part due to the fact that I have now spent
three decades plus in the spotted and Blanding’s turtle zones and
about a quarter of a century in the prime wood turtle center, as
finding a never-before-seen turtle, or one that goes back over years,
sometimes more than twenty years, is something of note… a cumulative
I hope I can find a way to keep accumulating. So it was with the first
turtle of the morning, a female with a distinct carapace anomaly: she
has eight vertebral scutes instead of the normal five. I am certain I
have recorded this configuration in a past notebook; that she is a
long-time-no-see individual. But for the slightest tail nip and small
mechanical wound on her first left marginal scute she is a perfect
turtle, this no longer common to see, following that winter of
devastating predation by otter(s). Her plastron is quite worn now, and
annuli very fine and clustered in the center, so I could not get a
clear reading of her age, but know she is at least twenty, and a
breeding adult, something all the more of consequence following that
predatory event. If I can one day find my first recording of her – how
to track this in all those notebooks? – I could determine an exact
age. Something for later years, or a posthumous task for someone who
might want to face the challenge… take the enormous time. The second
tortue du jour was yet another individual of some years, seven in this
case, I have not found before. And here again, in an area I have
traversed over and again over the course of many turtle seasons. Once
again I was struck with what surely seems a remarkable recruitment
within this population, or colony, of wood turtles. I need to try to
quantify it some day, share and compare with others who have
documented a colony over extended time. *** The morning took a
downward turn for me when I walked the nesting zones again, and found
two that had been taken by predators, this at some point over the past
72 hours. Part of the deal of course, and something to factor into the
recruitment scenario I had just marvelled at anew; but the finding
brought unavoidable disheartenment, perhaps so strongly because the
predation occurred so late in the going: the hatchlings, surely fully
formed and ready to pip from their eggshells, were so close to the
time to leave the nest. In fact, in this spring and summer of so many
things coming so early, it had dawned on me that turtle hatching could
well be notably ahead of the usual schedule, and in the case of wood
turtles, nearly always the first of species native to NH to leave the
nest, it could be imminent. Gray goldenrod has been in bloom some days
now – at first I did not take note, letting the pace of the season
escape me for a while. But yes, there was this favored plant of
nesting terrain already in full flower, and my personal adage has
always gone, “when the yellow hawkweed [king devil: (Hieracium
aurentiacum), unless the terminology has been changed] flowers,
turtles are nesting; and when gray goldenrod (Solidago nemeralis)
blooms, turtles are hatching.” Perhaps a wood turtle nest could hatch
any day now.

Therefore, back out again the first morning in August. Edge-searching
brought another reward: a top-dog/alpha male, one whose carapace has
taken on that sea-glass smoothness, along with the wide head and
broad, powerful front legs of older males. Here was another long-time-
no-see individual, and an especially reassuring find, in that he is
perfect to tail-tip. I can only think of finding only one other such
male following that winter of the otter. And it seems it would take
but one such male to assure that the adult females of this brook
confluence would be gravid come next nesting time. I returned to the
nesting terrain to find that a third nest had been taken in the
night… the highs and lows of bearing witness. I have always observed
predatory pressure to be relentless, even when I have let myself be
lulled into thinking that wood turtles have a degree of exemption. My
deepest disheartenment came with seeing more footprints than I had
seen the day before; footprints and horse tracks have been registered
throughout the educed nesting habitat, in some cases passing directly
over nests.
This I can only see (I have a long history) as a reflection of what is
to come by way of “pedestrian access; low-impact recreation” typical
of conservation areas.

Art Exhibit: I will have five pieces in the forthcoming “Four Legged”
exhibition at Pam Tarbell’s Mill Brook Gallery; Opening is Sunday,
September 19th, 1-5 PM. The exhibition runs from 17 Sept.- 14 Nov. A
percentage of sales resulting from the first weekend will go to
Concord-Merrimack County SPCA. I will have three turtle works (two
watercolors; one pen-and-ink) and two of my Stamp Art/mixed media
pieces (black bear in a twilight marsh; pair of deer in a red-cedar
oldfield) in this show. Mill Brook Gallery and Sculpture Garden
236
Hopkinton Road
Concord
, NH 03301
603
-226-2046

READING: I will be featured with another writer, Katharine Russell
Rich in the final weekend of the Tory Hill Readers Series presented by
the Warner Historical Association, beginning at 7 PM, Saturday 21
August, in the Town Hall. Redaings and discussion by the authors; Q&A
from those in attendance. For more information: