Reading Pictures

Low and Slow at Goose Lake Prairie

The blazing stars and white tops of rattlesnake masters are what you see here in this picture of Goose Lake Prairie — that and the nice, wide vista of this huge grassland. What you can’t see are the animals out there somewhere, down low on the ground, resting, trying not to dehydrate in the mid-day sun: Blanding’s turtles.

Blanding’s turtles are endangered in Illinois and in most of their range. Along with Mike Dreslick from the Illinois Natural History Survey and Mike Redmer from U.S. Fish & Wildlife, I’m working on a five-year project to trap and mark turtles to find out how many are out here, and to make estimates about the viability of the population.

Though you can’t tell from the photo, there are wet pockets all over the prairie. The Blanding’s turtles use the small, shallow ponds early in the year, and then as those dry up, they must move to deeper marshes. Most of the other natural areas that have Blanding’s turtles are relatively small — maybe 200 acres — so when the turtles try to move from place to place, they have to leave the preserves and sometimes they get hit by cars.

I like to go out to Goose Lake Prairie early in the day to check the traps, before it gets too hot. Sometimes that time of day, I’ll see one taking its time, walking along the trail. They move around a lot at night. But as the day goes on, they tend to hunker down in the thick vegetation or in some water. There are times when we are out there using the radio telemetry equipment in the prairie, and it might tell me there’s a turtle right at my feet. Even though I know it’s there, sometimes I still can’t see it. That’s how well they blend in to their surroundings.

Photo and description by Dan Kirk
As told to Jill Riddell
Goose Lake Prairie is protected by the
Illinois Department of Natural Resources