Rare Animal Sightings on the Lane Cove River

Fat Paddler and the Turtle playing "chicken"

Fat Paddler and the Turtle playing "chicken"

It was an absolutely stunning winter’s day in Sydney. Warm, sunny, no wind. Perfect paddling weather. So I decided to revisit the Lane Cove River off Sydney Harbour. Now, I’m putting in a pretty hard paddle when suddenly I hit something, something round and hard and somewhat turtle-shaped. Turtle-shaped? Did I just hit a turtle? Are there turtles in the Lane Cove River?

So I turn around and go back to find out if it really was a turtle, and if so, to see if it was ok.  And sure enough as I loop back around there’s a turtle floating still and dead-like in the water.

You ok little fella??

You ok little fella??

A bit of a touch on the shell however and he kicked his little legs and craned his neck around to have a look at me. Definitely alive, no damage, good as gold. So not wanting to disturb him anymore, I let him swim off before returning to my paddle.

I googled this when I got home, wondering if there were actually wild turtles in the Lane Cove River, or if he was a pet that had escaped into the river system. And sure enough, it seems there are two species of turtle native to the river.  The common Eastern Long-Necked Turtle (Chelodina longicollis) and the rarer Sydney Short-Necked Turtle (Emydura macquarii dharuk) both inhabit this area, and a quick comparison of photos of the two turtles proved that my friend is in fact the rarer Sydney Short-Necked Turtle.

So there you have it. You learn something new everyday!  🙂

Bye bye matey! Happy paddles!

Bye bye matey! Happy paddles!

The Fat Paddler by Sean Smith