NARRATOR: Soaked in the drama
of life and death,
these reptiles overcome the odds
and thrive in the fresh water
of central Nova Scotia.
The Wild Wild East's wetland habitats
are a refuge for old growth forests
and the species that depend upon them,
at the core of the second largest
biosphere reserve in Canada.
On the jagged coast of Canada's Eastern shore,
a delicate and diverse ecosystem
thrives on the fringes of the continent.
Welcome
to the Wild Wild East.
NARRATOR: Salty shores and rocky cliffs,
separate the province of Nova Scotia
from the rest of Canada.
Though surrounded by the sea,
Nova Scotia has no shortage of fresh water.
Abundant rain,
coastal fog
and temperate summers
have resulted in a multitude
of bogs, ponds,
streams and lakes.
A rich network of wetland habitats.
It's the beginning of summer
in Kejimkujik National Park,
located in southwestern Nova Scotia.
Established in 1968,
it's the second largest biosphere reserve in Canada.
It is also a National Historic site,
the ancient home of the Mi'kmaq people
who lived here for thousands of years.
Kejimkujik National Park
protects this unique wetland habitat
from human encroachment,
and ensures the survival of its animal inhabitants.
Like the Blanding's turtle.
Blanding's turtles are among Nova Scotia's
rarest creatures.
As few as 500 remain here in the wild.
This population probably migrated into Nova Scotia
during a warm period after the last glaciation,
about 5,000 years ago.
Blanding's mostly live around the Great Lakes,
with some small populations on the coast
and in Nova Scotia.
About 3,000 years ago, the land bridge
connecting Nova Scotia to New Brunswick flooded,
cutting the turtles off
from their mainland population.
As night falls over the park,
one of the most important residents
prepares to lay her eggs.
She slowly makes her way onto shore,
looking for the perfect spot for her nest.
Agile in the water,
she is much less graceful on the stony shoreline.
Blanding's take approximately 14 years
to reach sexual maturity,
and can live over 70 years.
With a slow reproductive rate,
they're particularly vulnerable to environmental
and habitat threats.
This makes the Blanding's a species at risk,
so the stakes are high for her clutch
to hatch successfully.
Remarkably, Blanding's turtles
do not appear to age once they reach adulthood.
A 20-year old and a 70-year old turtle
are nearly indistinguishable.
Blanding's turtles hibernate underwater
from mid-November until early April
to survive the harsh winters.
Blanding's lay their eggs in the early summer
under the relative safety of darkness.
The first step is finding a suitable nesting site
where she will lay between 6 and 20 eggs.
Nest selection is a careful procedure.
Guided by her instincts, she searches for a nest
with the right combination of soil,
temperature and moisture.
Temperature plays an important role
in determining the sex of the hatchlings.
When it's warmer, only female hatchlings will emerge.
Cooler temperatures favor the development of males.
Annual temperature variations of just a few degrees
ensure a balanced ratio
between male and female hatchlings over the years.
But this also makes turtles especially susceptible
to climate change.
Researchers claim that if the average earth temperature
rises even slightly, it would result
in only female clutches being born,
radically altering the reproductive future
of the Blanding's turtle.
Once she chooses a suitable nest site,
she excavates the land with her back legs.
She carves out a nest shaped like a vase,
round enough to hold her eggs,
with a smaller opening
to deter numerous egg predators.
Methodical and meticulous,
the egg laying procedure
can take over five hours.
The Blanding's eggs are slightly less than
half the size of a chicken's egg.
There are about two minutes
between the laying of each egg.
When all 12 of her eggs are laid,
she covers the nest.
The sand she uses to cover her eggs
is the only thing protecting the next generation.
This is her final act of motherhood for the season.
She retreats to the safety of the pond.
And joins the aquatic ecosystem she calls home.
Good nesting conditions in a certain spot
means multiple Blanding's
will often gather in one location,
which comes with inherent dangers for the eggs.
Rich in protein, eggs are dug up
by the predators of the wetlands.
A raccoon lurking in the nearby trees
could gobble up an entire generation
in just one evening.
Scattered across the beach,
evidence from a recent burglary.
With no new generation of turtles ready to hatch,
the Blanding's could be in trouble.
Fortunately, the endangered turtles
have a helping hand in the human world.
The Mersey Tobeatic Research Institute,
aided by a team of volunteers,
leads the fight to save the Blanding's turtles
in Nova Scotia.
They place these cages over the nests
to protect eggs in vulnerable areas
from raccoons and foxes
until the turtles are ready to hatch.
The Blandings' wetland sanctuaries
don't just protect this endangered species,
they also perform another important role
on a much larger scale.
Fresh water environments
are a crucial part of the inland ecosystem.
They clean fresh water, improving quality,
limit the effects of flooding
by trapping excess drainage
during heavy rainfalls,
and the shallow water allows light to penetrate
and sustains a huge diversity of plants
as well as aquatic creatures
above and below the surface.
Like this American toad,
just one of the 6,000 different amphibian species
found around the world.
The word amphibian is Greek in origin,
and means "both lives".
Species like the northern leopard frog
begin their "first life" living underwater,
breathing through gills like a fish,
before going through a metamorphosis,
from tadpole to frog
and having their "second life"
breathing air on the surface.
Because their life cycle shifts between water and land,
amphibians are sensitive
to the environmental conditions of both.
And so scientists believe amphibians
like the eastern American toad,
are "ecosystem indicators."
But these days, they're more like canaries in a coal mine.
Amphibian populations have suffered
widespread declines in recent decades.
There are many possible reasons why this is happening.
The shallow water they depend upon
also allows increased exposure
to UV radiation from the sun, which is thought
to cause high mortality rates in juveniles.
The potential lowering of fresh water levels
due to a warming climate in places like eastern Canada,
increases this hazard.
Habitat destruction and pollution also take their toll.
The rate of extinction across all amphibian species
is 100 times the natural extinction rate.
This loss affects the entire food chain
of the wetlands.
Undulating through the water,
a Maritime garter snake
uses the curves of its body
to glide across the surface.
To the amphibians of Nova Scotia,
this is their main predator.
To locate its prey,
the snake collects chemicals in the air
with its tongue.
It then inserts the fork into a special sense receptor,
called the Jacobson's organ,
on the roof of its mouth.
The snake uses this process to 'taste the air' for prey.
With a North American toad in its jaws,
this snake demonstrates how it can swallow a meal
twice its size.
It's not a true venomous snake, like a rattler,
yet the garter snake's bite
helps subdue the frog so it can be swallowed whole.
Saliva lubricates the frog,
as the garter flexes its stomach muscles
along its thorax to consume its meal.
Now swallowed, the digestion process begins.
A Blanding's turtle is also on the hunt.
They feed on insects such as dragonfly nymphs and beetles,
as well as snails, worms, fishes, and vegetation.
They can spend over two hours
hunting for food underwater
before coming up for air.
The bite-sized fish do their best
to evade the Blanding's, moving in rigid formation.
Seeing the turtle approach,
minnows display the "selfish herd theory."
The most vulnerable fish are the ones
on the periphery of the school.
So when a predator swims in,
the minnows compete to be in the safety of the centre.
The turtle isn't as swift a swimmer as the minnows.
They elude her.
She'll move on to an easier meal.
Snakes,
fish,
frogs and toads,
all co-exist in the protective waters
of Kejimkujik National Park.
This sanctuary helps secure
the future for the wetlands
and its inhabitants.
But not every threat can be controlled.
Blanding's don't migrate;
however, females will sometimes travel long distances
to seek suitable nesting sites.
Leaving the protection of the pond
they face the modern world head-on.
Putting the females at the greatest risk.
Traversing asphalt and dodging cars,
the Blanding's ancient migration routes
are now hazardous pathways.
In early September,
as the summer warmth begins to wane,
new life begins to stir along the lake-shores
of Kejimkujik National Park.
Emerging up to 3 months after being laid,
the Blanding's turtle takes its first steps with purpose.
Instinct and the sun's reflection on the lake
lead the newly hatched turtle to water.
It's barely bigger than a quarter.
Its carapace will harden as the turtle ages.
For the next two years, the young Blanding's
remain vulnerable to predation from raccoons,
coyotes, foxes and skunks.
But the water provides a safe place,
shelter amongst the lily pads.
One by one the Blanding's siblings emerge
and waddle into their new world.
It will be nearly two decades
before they reach adulthood,
and only 4% of Blanding's will make it.
Once they're fully grown,
their survival rate skyrockets to 98%
due to their size and formidable shell.
But even then they'll remain timid,
retreating underwater or into their shells,
when danger rears its head.
Still, they need all the help they can get.
They have allies on the lookout.
In 1990 the Province of Nova Scotia
gave the Blanding's turtle protected status.
Since then the reptile has become the literal poster child
for wetland conservation.
It looks the part too.
The natural curve of the turtle's mouth
makes it seem as if it's always smiling.
Protecting Blanding's means keeping tabs
on their movement through the protected areas
and minimizing potential hazards.
Using a radio transmitter, a team of volunteers
track down adult turtles that have been tagged.
Once they find their nesting locations,
they can monitor survival rates
of last year's hatchlings.
Every hatchling is weighed, measured
and marked with notches in its carapace.
so it can be identified for years to come.
A quick snip to the shell identifies them for life.
Turtles were first marked this way
over 50 years ago.
Some of those turtles are still alive today
in these same shallow waters.
Fall gives way to winter.
And underneath the frozen surface of the water,
the Blanding's spend the season
tucked into the muddy lake bottom.
Here they're warmed by the heat
retained in the surface layers of soil and sediment.
When spring arrives, the turtles thaw out
and swim back to the surface,
no worse for wear.
When the seasons move on and the ground thaws,
all of the wetlands spring back to life.
It's mating season for this pair of Eastern painted turtles
basking in the sun to warm their cold-blooded bodies.
Painted turtles are found across North America
and are the most abundant turtles on the continent.
Mating begins as soon as turtles emerge from hibernation.
The male tries to win over the female
by stroking his partner's neck.
After repeating this behavior several times,
the female sinks to the bottom and the male follows,
and mating begins.
After mating, the female painted turtle
will continue that success in due time,
when she's ready to lay her eggs.
It all depends on the right environmental conditions
of weather and available food.
She can delay fertilization by storing sperm in her body
until conditions are ideal.
If the right conditions aren't met,
she can hold onto the sperm for up to 3 years.
Female painted turtles sometimes exhibit
a mysterious behavior when preparing a nest.
She will sometimes dig several nests
but not lay eggs.
Perhaps sensing that the moisture, warmth,
texture, or smell are not right,
she moves on and leaves behind a 'false nest',
which could also act as a decoy
to distract predators.
While habitat loss and road kills
have reduced the turtle's population,
the painted turtle's ability
to live in human-disturbed settings,
has helped the population thrive.
They also have a speedier reproductive rate
than most turtles, reaching sexual maturity at age 5,
which helps them replenish their population more quickly.
Fossil records reveal that turtles appeared on earth
at the same time as the dinosaurs.
Now, they may be facing the same fate.
Their survival isn't just about protecting the turtles,
the wetland ecosystem and the other animals it supports
are also at stake.
To endure, all species depend on the ability
to adapt, reproduce and thrive.
And the fundamental key to all creatures' survival
is water.
The wetlands are crucial to maintaining
a healthy, natural water ecology.
Wetlands filter and help maintain balanced
levels of water within the ecosystem
through a continuous cycle of rain and evaporation.
They also protect us from climate change,
by absorbing carbon and reducing greenhouse gases.
And wetlands protect life
at the base of the food chain.
Though progress seems to move at a turtle's pace,
there have been significant steps
in the right direction.
Wetland habitats and the creatures in them
are protected all over the world
in places like Kejimkujik National Park.
Preserving a vital habitat
so all the animals of the wetlands
can wade toward a better tomorrow.
All together,
in the Wild Wild East.
♪ THEME MUSIC ♪