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Matt Evans, the zoo\u2019s assistant curator of herpetology, said one of his colleagues grabbed him and said he should come look. The colleague told him, \u201cYou\u2019re not going to believe this,\u201d recalled Evans. \u201cAnd there it was. We saw it, in the corner of the large pool, a hatchling. \u2026 It looked beautiful.\u201d<\/p>\n
The birth, experts said, is a major milestone because it\u2019s the first time a painted river terrapin has successfully bred at the D.C. zoo.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is a big deal for us,\u201d Evans said. \u201cWe didn\u2019t know what day to expect the hatchling. \u2026 It\u2019s no easy feat for such a tiny turtle to be born and get to water. \u2026 Seeing it swim around and having it be healthy, it made us pretty happy.\u201d<\/p>\n
Although the new terrapin hatched last summer, zoo officials waited until last week to share the news on the zoo\u2019s social media account; they often hold off a few weeks or months to make sure a newborn animal survives. The federal government shutdown last year also held up the birth announcement.<\/p>\n
Painted river terrapins are native to mangrove swamps and river estuaries in Indonesia and Malaysia. Their population has dwindled because they get caught in fishermen\u2019s nets and are sold as pets or for traditional medicines in the illegal wildlife trade. Their habitats have been harmed by companies that mine sand where they make their nests, experts said.<\/p>\n
With upturned snouts and ridges on their shells, they look distinctly different from other turtles. Females weigh up to 50 pounds, and males roughly half that. They eat dark, leafy greens; carrots; apples; and grapes. It takes several years before they reach sexual maturity, and in captivity, painted river terrapins live 50 to 80 years.<\/p>\n
The D.C. zoo has had its four terrapins for about a decade. Its two females are related to each other and came from the Fort Worth Zoo in Texas; the two males, also related to each other, came from the Henry Doorly Zoo in Omaha. To help boost the species\u2019s population and keep it genetically diverse, the zoo planned to breed them after a recommendation from the Association of Zoos and Aquariums\u2019 Species Survival Plan.<\/p>\n
The terrapin is one of nearly 60 endangered species at the National Zoo and its conservation campus in Front Royal, Virginia. Last year, experts had notable success breeding species that are either endangered or extinct in the wild, including a red panda cub, several black-footed ferrets, a Przewalski\u2019s horse and two Guam kingfishers.<\/p>\n
In the fall, zookeepers noticed their male terrapins changing colors – a common characteristic of the species that happens in breeding season. Their heads turn from an olive-gray color to white with a bright red stripe on top. Their shells become streaked with green, white and black stripes, looking almost like a watermelon, experts said.<\/p>\n
Then the males \u201cdanced\u201d and swam around the females, rubbing their front legs and tails – all signs of courtship, Evans said. \u201cThere\u2019s a cuteness to it. You\u2019ll see males take their fingernails and stroke the female\u2019s face.\u201d<\/p>\n
In the past, Evans said, the females didn\u2019t seem interested. But last year as they matured and grew, they were more receptive.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen they arrived, the females were smaller and younger than the males, so it\u2019s taken them a number of years to get on the same page as the males,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Still, because terrapins breed a few feet below the water\u2019s surface, it\u2019s hard for keepers to know – much less see – exactly when it happens. They didn\u2019t notice that one of the females had made a nest and laid eggs in a spot where there\u2019s an infrared heated area that Pip, the tomistoma, favors because it\u2019s warm and private.<\/p>\n
Usually, the eggs would have been scooped up for a 60- to 90-day gestation period and hatched in an incubator.<\/p>\n
Keepers later found about 20 other eggs in the nest but don\u2019t know why they didn\u2019t hatch. Experts said some of the eggs may have been infertile or didn\u2019t fully develop for unknown reasons.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a mystery as to which of the adult terrapins are the parents.<\/p>\n
\u201cNormally, males try to breed with the largest females,\u201d Evans said, \u201cbut both our females are about equal in size. The males pursued both females, so the parents could be any combination of moms and dads.\u201d<\/p>\n
Evans said they took the hatchling out of the adult enclosure so experts can monitor it and make sure it\u2019s eating and growing.<\/p>\n
At roughly 5 months old now, the hatchling is doing well in its own digs – behind the scenes and not on display for visitors – with a smaller, four-inch-deep pond and UV lights for basking, Evans said. The hatchling, like the adults, comes out of the water in the evenings and basks on pieces of cork bark and rocks.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s doing everything I would have wanted and hoped for,\u201d Evans said.<\/p>\n
It can take several years for experts to figure out a painted river terrapin\u2019s gender. Evans said he and his teammates are hoping the adults reproduce more.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe fact that our animals are breeding and producing healthy offspring is a good barometer that we\u2019re meeting their needs.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Matt…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":414303,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[79,201],"class_list":["post-414302","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-science","tag-wildlife"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/414302","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=414302"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/414302\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/414303"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=414302"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=414302"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=414302"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}