The Dungarvon River is not only a hotspot for recreational fishing, but also for wood turtle spotting.  The wood turtle (Glyptemys insculpta) is listed as an federally “threatened” species that enjoys relatively fast moving, gravel bottom watercourses.  As their names suggests, they do head out of rivers and streams into the adjacent woods in search of food, such as worms, slugs, mushrooms, and berries. While there, they are also looking for sandy or gravelly banks to dig out a nest for their eggs. They are distinctive, with orange-red legs and green-grey shells up to 25 centimetres long.  There are a number of reasons why biologists are concerned about the fate of these turtles, including their very slow reproductive rate, mortality by vehicle strikes, and that people collect them for pets, to name a few. In areas where we have found wood turtles we’ve increased the size of the watercourse buffer to accommodate their travels into the upland.