Eastern Box Boxturtle 2025 Summer Season

Turtle M27 (male)

1.7 GPS miles tracked this season. M27 is another study turtle who seems to stay within a defined, relatively small, primary activity area: a ridge top and north slope, shared with M57(f) and others who travel through. M27 met with M76 a new find this season, inthe power line ROW.

Turtle M24 (female) Soon after emergence from hibernation, M24 climbed the slope and crossed the road into the meadow where she often goes to nest. She returned from the meadow after only a short stay, and found that male M3, who normally meets M24's return, and mates, had been at the mating site, and left already. M24 continued to her current activity area where she remained the for season,

1.0 GPS miles tracked this season.

Turtle M1(Female) was tracked less than normal again this season due to the hot weather and long distances. M1 did not cross the road into the meadow to nest this season,

0.8 GPS miles tracked this season.

Turtle M3(male) strayed from his normal activity area for the forth season. He met and mated with M43 a number of times, but again never mated with M24 this season. Turtle M3's change in travel behavior in recent years has more than doubled his tracked travel distance compared to most of his previous tracked years.

He did not cross the road, normal for this turtle, but traveled close by the road mid summer.

2.9 GPS miles tracked this season.

Turtle M10 (male)

2.0 GPS miles tracked this season. M10 again traveled much further from his primary activity area than most prevoius seasons, including across 2 ridges and almost to a busy highway .

After spending a good bit of the summer in the new area, he re-retraced his travels and,after crossing the roas for a second time, headed back toward his normal activity area. He hibernated in a location partway back, as it rapisdly turned into cold fall weather. The yellow route inthe photo is M10's 2025 forray, the white is from 2024.

Turtle M13 (Male) usually thought of as a ridge resident, M13 left the ridgetop for most of the summer and traveled into the meadow and woods edge.

1.6 GPS miles tracked this season

Turtle M50 (male) M50 hibernated in 2024 at the edge of a ROW

This male was once thought to be a possible transient, but has continued to travel within the study area. No definate primary activity area has yet to been determined.

M50 was tracked 1.9 GPS miles this season. (yellow)

Turtle M48 (male) is primarily a ridge-top resident, and again this year, that is where he chose to stay most of this season.

Turtle M48 is rarely observed mating or meeting, but usually covers a large area of the ridgetop during the summer seasons

0.6 GPS miles tracked this season.(yellow)

Turtle M49 (female) Another large and active female, M49 was originally found in 2017, but lost only 2 days later. She has spent most of her travels since being re-found, in the hollow across the ridge, and has hibernated in the same location on the very top of the ridge for many seasons. She travels to the Cabin Meeting Area several times each year and her travels cover approximately the same area every season.

1.5 GPS miles tracked this season (yellow)

Turtle M57 (female) Since being injured on a long forray 2 years ago, M57 has remained mostly inside her primary activity area. This season she made one long loop across the north slope into M71, and M74's activity areas and returned. She shares this area with M27(male), but has not yet been observed mating..

0.8 GPS miles tracked this season.

Turtle M63 (female) Originally found new July 2019 on the asphault of my own driveway (here), M63 was tracked for 2 seasons before being lost due to bad transmitters. An NPS employee found M63 crossing the road in 2022 and ripped off tranmitters, vial and other markings........but as a result she was lost for the remainder of that season as well as 2023.

1.3 GPS miles tracked this season (yellow)

Turtle M58 (male) was tracked out of hibernation on top of the ridge and back into hibernation in 2024.

M58 was found 9/2/18, lost, found again in 2019, lost, and found once again in September 2020 when meeting with M13 on the top of the ridge. M58 spends time during the summer months in the lower meadow, where other turtles go to meet and mate and nest.

1.7 GPS miles tracked this season.

Turtle M68 (Male), 351 grams, was found mating with M24 on 7/28/21. M24 traveled outside her normal activity area to find this male. M68 is evidently not a transient, as he stayed almost entirely within the area of the ridgetop and slopes the entire season

0.3 GPS miles tracked in 2025

Turtle M73 (male), 490 grams, was found 9/13/22 close to M38(f). He is certainly an Edsel Hollow resident and travels long distances each season, but all within the hollow. This turtle appears to travel the same part of the slopes as M49 (f), but have rarely been found close together

2.1 GPS miles tracked in 2025 (yellow line)

Turtle M74 (female), 450 grams, was found 8/19/23, while searching for M71. She stayed nearby the rest of the season on the lower slope and did not cross the road, although she was found close to the road a few times.

0.9 GPS miles tracked in 2025 (yellow line)

This entire summer season was an odd mix of cool and moist weather , long, hot peiods, rainy wet periods and ending a long stretch of below normal temperatures going into the winter months. Rainfall totals for the season were abnormally low and drought monitoring was part of the daily weather reports.

Three new turtles were found this season. M76 (male) was found while mating with (M63) female and M78 (male) was found meeting with M73 (male) at the cabin meeting area. Juvenile M77 was found mid morning while crossing the roadway, but escaped before he could be radio tagged. Male M64 was found dead in hibernation, but no other deathes occurred this season.

Turtle M46 (male), lost in 2018, was found and turned into the wildlife center, who released him after trearment. He was found 8 1/2 miles from his last known location.

Turtle M18 (male) is primarily a meadow resident during the summer months, but usually hibernates in the woods.nearby. M18 split his travels between meadow and woods, this season, but that also included the woods edge with is moister that woods or meadow...

1.7 GPS miles tracked this season.

Turtle M29 (male) primarily a meadow resident, again spent most of his season on or near the redge top and traveled close to the busy road before reversing his course: he did not cross. (yellow route)

0.8 GPS miles tracked this season

Turtle M38 (female) . .Since first found, M38has remained an Edsol hollow resident who primarily stays close to and within the cabin meeting area including nearly all hibernations and meeting and matings. This season she decided to travel over the ridge top into the adjacent drainage and onto the south slope where she remained for the summer and hibernation.

0.7 GPS miles tracked the 2025 season.

Turtle M43 (female) spent nearly the entire season traveling her normal activity area, but as is becoming normal, made one long forray back to the Cabin Meeting Area and returned to her primary activity area. M43 may be making this long trek to nest, but that is not yet known. M43 is observed mating with M3 and other males one or more time each season, and this summer, M3 traveled to M43's area several times.

1.7 GPS miles tracked this season. (yellow)

Turtle M42 (female) is primarily a resident of the sheltered cove and south slope where she hibernates, but travels to the meadow, crossing and re-crossing the road during summer seasons after traveling a very long distance.

1.5 GPS miles tracked this season (yellow)

Turtle M53 (female), a large and colorful adult, spends nearly all of her time on the very top of the ridge in the woods, and occasionally found in the meadow, close to M42(F), M11(F). another large female. Meetings between females in this population is unusual.

1.7 GPS miles tracked this season (yellow)

Turtle M6 (female)

1.1 GPS mile tracked this season. M1 crossed the road into the medow this season, a common activity for this turtle, and crossed back onto her normal south slope and hibernated in the upper stump hole,