{"id":6757,"date":"2011-06-10T08:00:17","date_gmt":"2011-06-10T13:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/?p=6757"},"modified":"2011-06-09T23:56:12","modified_gmt":"2011-06-10T04:56:12","slug":"former-apsu-graduate-student-discovers-new-turtle-species","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/2011\/06\/10\/former-apsu-graduate-student-discovers-new-turtle-species\/","title":{"rendered":"Former APSU Graduate Student Discovers New Turtle Species"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"AustinClarksville, TN<\/strong> – There was something strange about the turtle, aside from its enormous head. Normally, the other species in the broad-headed group of map turtles confined themselves to a single major river system, but Austin Peay State University alum Josh Ennen (\u201905) knew this particular turtle was listed as living in two separate rivers.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat was interesting, so I started looking at the genetics of the species,\u201d he said. He compared populations of Graptemys gibbonsi (Pascagoula map turtle) from the Pascagoula and Pearl rivers.<\/p>\n

\"APSU<\/a>

APSU student Jeffrey Horton works on a sculpture of a hand while taking a Steampunk Sculpture class at APSU this summer. The goggles he is wearing were also part of a project for the class. (Photo By Cris Hagen\/Savannah River Ecology Lab)<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cThey were genetically different from each other,\u201d he said. \u201cNext, we went back and did morphological analyses to see if they were physically different. And we concluded that they were different morphologically.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was a pivotal moment for the study of field biology. Ennen had just discovered a new species of turtle \u2013 Graptemys pearlensis. It was the first turtle species described in this country since 1992.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat\u2019s rare about the discovery is that it was in a developed country, the United States, and it\u2019s a larger vertebrate,\u201d he said. \u201cThe discovery of most new species or large vertebrate are usually restricted to isolated and\/or remote portions of the globe, such as the rain forests.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for G. pearlensis, Ennen said, \u201cIt\u2019s a conspicuous animal that people knew where it was, they just didn\u2019t identify it correctly.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ennen, a Ph.D. student at the time of the discovery with the University of Southern Mississippi (USM), recently had a paper he co-authored on his findings published as the cover article for \u201cChelonian Conservation and Biology: The International Journal of Turtle and Tortoise Research.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt made the front cover,\u201d he said. \u201cAll this hard work of collecting data and analyzing data, but I look at it as just another manuscript.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ennen\u2019s interest in field biology began almost a decade ago when, as an undergraduate student at Maryville College, he conducted research on frogs for his thesis. In 2003, he enrolled at APSU as a graduate student, eager to work with the school\u2019s Center of Excellence for Field Biology.<\/p>\n

It was while studying under APSU biology professor Dr. A. Floyd Scott that Ennen found his new interest \u2013 turtles.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was pretty much that turtles were where the opportunity was to do research,\u201d he said. \u201cI worked under Dr. Scott. I did two studies on a turtle species in Tennessee, the striped neck musk turtle. I published one paper for tracking turtles for 24 hours, to determine their daily movement patterns.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ennen graduated from APSU in 2005, and he recently earned his Ph.D. at USM. Now, he\u2019s in Flagstaff, AR, doing postdoctorate work as a wildlife biologist for the U.S. Geological Survey.<\/p>\n

But his doctoral work in the southeastern United States, identifying the 57th species of turtle living in this country, will have a significant impact on that area of field biology for years to come. Ennen, however, is simply happy to contribute to the field\u2019s scholarly conversation.<\/p>\n

\u201cI get excited when I do good work and I publish something,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

For more information on the APSU Center of Excellence for Field Biology, contact that office at 931-221-7019.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Clarksville, TN – There was something strange about the turtle, aside from its enormous head. Normally, the other species in the broad-headed group of map turtles confined themselves to a single major river system, but Austin Peay State University alum Josh Ennen (\u201905) knew this particular turtle was listed as living in two separate rivers. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[5],"tags":[8754,23,6633,262,8755,8753,8749,8750,8751,2745,8752],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4xGYI-1KZ","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6757"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6757"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6757\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6759,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6757\/revisions\/6759"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6757"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6757"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6757"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}