Turtle eggs at Petrie Island get tender loving care

It's tough out there for unhatched turtle eggs, but a group of conservationists is trying to make it easier at Petrie Island.

The popular beaches in east Ottawa are home to three of the eight turtle species found in Ontario: snapping turtles, painted turtles and northern map turtles.

Shy eastern musk turtles and Blanding's turtles (a threatened species) could frequent Petrie Island too, but that's unclear.

The turtles lay eggs every spring, but up to 95 per cent of clutches can be destroyed by predators such as skunks and raccoons, according to biologist Malcolm Fenech, a leader for the Petrie Island Turtle Project.

To help get more eggs to hatch, project members have been gathering eggs to incubate themselves, indoors, in Tupperware containers filled with damp vermiculite to prevent them from drying out completely.

The goal of the project isn't to increase the populations of the turtles, Fenech said, but to slow their decline.

Fenech said it's "very time consuming" to hunt for nests. "The easiest way is actually coming up on a turtle laying the eggs," he said, but that's hard to do.

Thankfully the Petrie Island community has been supportive, alerting the team to nest locations on social media, Fenech said.

About 400 eggs have been collected and placed in an incubator the size of a bar fridge at the offices of the Ottawa Riverkeeper, just off the Sir George-Étienne Cartier Parkway in Rockcliffe.

Not only do they manage to hatch about 90 per cent of the eggs they collect, they can also help determine how many eggs become male and female.

The hotter it is, the more females are created. The cooler it is, the more males are created.

Fenech said they keep the temperature at about 28 C, which results in clutches that are about 60 percent female and 40 per cent male.

After they hatch, the young turtles will be released on specific dates in August. The dates will be announced in advance so that interested residents can come and watch.

When they're released, the rest is up to them.

"I wish we could protect them a little bit better when they are hatchlings, but they do need to learn to be on their own," Fenech said.