Meeting Abstract
Environmental conditions during early development critically affect morphology, behavior, and survival. However, nest temperature in oviparous species also could affect post-hatching traits of offspring, such as emergence behaviors. We monitored Painted Turtle (Chrysemys picta (Schneider, 1783)) nests to examine how thermal conditions influence offspring survival and nest emergence. We recorded hourly temperatures within nest cavities during embryonic development in summer 2016 and after hatching through the following January. Hatching success was improved by thermal moderation within nests during summer, whereas post-hatching survival was enhanced by warmer average fall temperatures and greater thermal maxima in winter. Emergence of neonates from nests was observed from 19 March through 12 May 2017. More hours spent below 0° C in nests increasingly delayed onset of emergence. For nearly all nests with live offspring, siblings did not emerge en masse, but instead departed the nest across multiple days. This emergence duration was positively correlated with the thermal maxima nests experienced in summer, fall, and winter. Differences in thermal environments among nests during embryonic development and after hatching elicit considerable variation in survival and emergence timing of C. picta hatchlings.
