By Lauren McNulty, Bay Nature
If you remember the Presidio’s Mountain Lake of 15 years ago, you remember the algae blooms in summer and the dead fish floating in the lake. To see the lake a few weeks ago, as over 50 people did at a triumphant restoration event at the outdoor classroom, is to see something else entirely: a restored place clean enough to host Western pond turtles. Which is what the spectators were there to see: the second and final release of turtles into the lake, a last chance to see the turtles off and perhaps a last chance to see a Western Pond turtle up close outside of a zoo.
The only time the turtles can really be seen in the now healthy lake is when they’re basking, said Jessie Bushell, the director of conservation at the San Francisco Zoo, but there is one female turtle who likes to bask on the floaters near the beach on the south shore of the lake on sunny days.
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