The Ausable Bayfield Conservation Authority is inviting people to come out to the Morrison Dam near Exeter in early September to help them release about 100 snapping turtle hatchlings into the pond at the Morrison Dam.
Healthy Watershed Technician Hope Brock explains the clutches of eggs were collected in the spring because they were laid in inappropriate locations or from females that had been hit by cars.
They were incubated and are now ready to be released.
Brock says the hatchlings are about the size of a loonie or toonie and are very vulnerable to predators at this time so they are released into the Morrison Dam where there is lots of vegetation to hide them.
Brock adds once they survive their childhood they can live as long as 100 years.
The release is 2pm until 6pm on Thursday, September 1.
Brock explains the event is also a fund-raiser for the Ontario Turtle Conservation Centre in Peterborough.
The snapping turtles are a species-at-risk.
