From 2019–2023, the Northeast Eastern Box Turtle Working Group — a team of state, federal, university, and NGO biologists — collaborated to develop a status assessment and conservation plan for the eastern box turtle in the northeastern United States (Virginia to Maine). As a part of this project, we:
- Developed a standardized population monitoring protocol
- Identified key threats to population persistence
- Estimated habitat impairment across the Northeast
- Created a Conservation Area Network representing key regional priorities
- Established a Conservation Action Plan to guide future conservation efforts
- Developed Best Management Practices
The Status Assessment for the Eastern Box Turtle in the Northeastern United States provides information that will allow the reader to build a solid understanding of the ecology of the eastern box turtle (subspecies woodland box turtle, Terrapene carolina carolina) in the northeast, understand the threats to the species, and relevant research conducted to date. This is meant to be a complimentary document to the Conservation Plan for the Eastern Box Turtles in the Northeastern United States, which provides recommendations to address and reduce the threats and a framework to increase the potential for the long-term persistence of the eastern box turtle.
The Conservation Plan for the Eastern Box Turtle in the Northeastern United States aims to facilitate collaborative conservation at the regional level that addresses the numerous challenges facing the eastern box turtle (Terrapene carolina carolina) that were identified within the Status Assessment for the Eastern Box Turtle in the Northeastern United States (Erb and Roberts 2023). The fundamental goal of this Conservation Plan is to support the persistence and adaptive capacity of the eastern box turtle in the northeastern United States from Maine to Virginia.