Maine Turtle Roadkill Survey

Wildlife need to move across the landscape to find food and water and areas to rest, breed, and raise their young. Roads and traffic can make it difficult or impossible for animals to move safely. And for species like turtles that live a long time but don’t reproduce until they’re fairly old, losing one breeding individual can set the population back for years, and can even lead to local extinction.

This project is designed to collect data from stretches of roadway in Maine that have been identified as having a high potential for turtle mortality. Participants will be assigned survey routes and will be trained in proper data collection methods for this study. Results will be used to identify roadway segments where turtle mortality is the highest, in order to develop mitigation strategies at these and similar sites to reduce or eliminate turtle mortality. menos ↑