THE discovery of 96 snake-necked turtles which were mauled to death by foxes at Bibra Lake could be the tip of the iceberg, say volunteer Turtle Trackers.

The trackers had the grim task of hauling out the carcasses, most with legs and heads chewed off, during the last week but told the Herald they could only get to about 20 per cent of the lake.

A cause of death couldn’t be established for another 21 dead turtles they came across on the dry lake bed.

Bibra Lake Turtle Trackers lead co-ordinator Joyce Gadalon said it was a devastating find.

“I am literally in tears just talking about it right now,” Ms Gadalon said.

“I found about 42 turtles to begin with and then I made the call to my other turtle tracker colleagues… the rest of my team came and we found the rest of the 117 carapaces on the dry lake bed.

“The reason why we were out there is because the community saw foxes out in the lake a week before that, and it’s devastating to hear that foxes were carrying around these turtles and eating them right in public.”

Fellow tracker Felicity Bairstow said birds were likely to have taken mauled bodies from the lake bed to peck out the remaining flesh in inaccessible bushland, meaning the real toll was likely much higher.

Murdoch University research fellow at the Harry Butler Institute, Anthony Santoro runs the Saving Our Snake-Necked Turtle project and said the carnage could be a step towards a localised extinction.

“This is a devastating finding and the loss of approximately 100 turtles just from this one event, combined with the rest that occurred from predation and stuff like that, is going to have a massive impact on their future viability,” Dr Santoro said.

“This specific finding highlights the very real impact that climate change and predation can have on a species and it also shows how the when they’re combined, in instances like this, that the impact can just multiply exponentially.”

Climate change

Dr Santoro said with lakes dry across Perth, it was likely fox predation was happening elsewhere and climate change would see similar events into the future.

“That further reinforces the need for a massive collaborative effort across the state, at least Perth and the South West, in feral animal control,” he said.

“At the moment, everyone’s doing it kind of by themselves, and it doesn’t do anything because foxes travel between places.”

Dr Santoro said if further predation occurred, artificial incubation and “head-starting programs” might be needed to ensure the turtles didn’t become locally extinct in the near future.

“That problem, and turtles in general, need to be better resourced,” he said.

“There currently just in not enough funding for us to do the research we need to save the species.”

A source from Murdoch told the Herald that Dr Santoro and the SOSNT project are caught in a catch-22; he believes the turtles likely qualify as a threatened species, but can’t prove it because he’s unlikely to get funding for a species that’s not already listed as threatened.

Dr Santoro said the turtles were the wetland’s top predator and their demise would see the lower-order species get “out of control”.

“The hatchlings themselves eat a lot of bugs, so the midges and mosquitoes that no one seems to like.”

City of Cockburn environmental education officer Vicky Hartill said the turtle deaths pointed to a “climate issue” rather than just foxes.

“The City of Cockburn is dedicated to turtle conservation, and we’re in it for the long haul.

“In terms of foxes, it’s complicated.

“We do fox control management, and we work with our surrounding land managers with their fox control program.

“From the City’s perspective, for this autumn season, we’ve extended the fox control program.

“So the trapping has continued for much longer than it normally would, but we’re not in a normal year.

“This is a drying climate and this is a new benchmark for us to look at ways where we can improve not only feral animal control, but turtle conservation across the board.”

Ms Hartill said the City had been looking at other water sources to add to the lake, but it was a complex issue.

“Water is a scarce resource,” she said.

“We take it from one place to put it somewhere else, we’re removing that water from another ecosystem or another location.”

Ms Hartill said locals could help out by reporting feral animal sightings in the wetlands to the City.

by STEVE GRANT