A wildlife expert from Washburn University will be the guest presenter at the Smoky Hills Audubon Society’s monthly gathering later this week.

According to the organization, Dr. Benjamin Reed goes where turtles go, and that can include a thorny forest, a sunbaked prairie, a patch of poison ivy or elbow-deep in a dark hole. Like a submarine sonar technician, field biologists listen to a receiver and the faint changes in volume as they sweep the Yagi antenna around, walking in the direction that produces the loudest beeps, like a game of hot and cold.

Dr.  Reed and his students record the location, weight and size of each turtle they locate. They keep track throughout the year of when turtles become active in the spring, when they start brumation in the fall and how much they may move throughout a year.

The gathering and presentation will be in room 229 of Peters Science Hall on the campus of Kansas Wesleyan University this Thursday evening at 7:30. The event is free and open to the public.