A First Billboard to Save Turtles

Turtle Guardians celebrates the first billboard to raise awareness about the vulnerability of turtles in Ontario. The "It Takes 60 Years to Replace One" message alerts drivers, that may not have understood, the length of time it takes until one egg succeeds to reach adulthood in the overall population. Ancestors had the mistaken idea that turtles were as prolific and abundant as rodents, and that they could reproduce as quickly, but we now know that this is simply not true. In fact, turtles may be one of the very few species that has such a low recruitment rate and therefore who take the longest to be replaced in nature- thus the reason turtles need to live to such old ages, likely beyond 275 years old. Therefore each one, and especially the adults and adult females that are crossing roads to nesting sites, are precious. The first billboard went up in May on Highway 62, south of Bancroft and north of Madoc. This highway is renowned for high turtle mortality, with fast cars and transport trucks. However, this highway is also fairly straight and flat, allowing motorists to see turtles ahead and avoid them. We are now raising money to install more billboards in other key areas across Ontario. Help us by donating through our GoFundMe Campaign