[crickets chirping] [transmitter beeping] - [Narrator] Research coordinator Kaitlin Saxton is looking for a Box turtle that lives in this forest not far from Interstate 40.

[transmitter beeping] The beep of the turtle's transmitter tells Saxton she's getting close.

[transmitter beeping] The closer Saxton gets to the turtle, the louder the beat.

After a 10-minute walk, Saxton can hear that she's honing in on the turtle, the turtle's near, but where?

- They'll like bury themselves under the Pine needles.

So sometimes it's hard to spot them, but I think he's like right in here.

- [Narrator] This Eastern Box turtle is one of six Box turtles that researchers track at the Piedmont Wildlife Center.

- This is the radio telemetry.

This is the transmitter that goes on the turtle shell.

We just kind of secure it with a little bit of epoxy and this is the antenna.

It doesn't hurt the turtle or interfere with their behaviors in any way.

- [Narrator] Saxton records the turtle's GPS location, its size, and the outside temperature at the time of sighting.

North Carolina had no plan to protect Eastern Box turtles until two professors from UNC Greensboro started the Box Turtle Connection Project in 2007.

The project has 30 sites around the state where researchers track the numbers and health of the turtles.

The Piedmont Wildlife Center or PWC is one of those sites.

Biologists refer to Box turtles as an indicator species.

That means that a drop in their numbers or health can signal a threat to the entire ecosystem.

The International Union For Conservation of Nature calls Eastern Box turtles a vulnerable species.

That's because of habitat loss and urbanization.

Urbanization happens when natural, previously undeveloped areas turn into cities through the construction of roads, houses, and other buildings.

- [Kaitlin] This is Shelly.

She is an Eastern Box turtle.

She's our only female ambassador turtle that we have at Piedmont Wildlife Center.

We estimate that she's maybe around 40 years old or so.

And then Sheldon, the one who's moving around with the orange coloration, is the male.

They both came to us from the same place, from someone.

It was after someone who had a bunch of Box turtles that they couldn't take care of, needed to find new places for them so they came to live with us.

They go to programs, they go to schools, they go to birthday parties, they just teach people about Box turtles and give people the opportunity to meet a Box turtle up close.

- [Instructor] All scales but the scales feel different from the shell.

- [Narrator] So close that visitors to the wildlife center can learn how to tell males from females.

Turtles like Sheldon and Shelly help schoolchildren learn about wildlife.

Recent visitor, Cora Schisler, was paying special attention.

- I like Box turtles because of how unique they are.

It's just so cool because they have all different features than other turtles can't do.

- And typically males are gonna be the more brightly colored ones.

Another way we can tell that Sheldon is a male is if we were to lift him up and look at the bottom of his shell, which is called the plastron.

There's a little indentation where you can put your thumb and on a female that would be more flat.

And then one more way we can tell that Shelly is female is if we look at her overall shape of her shell.

It's a lot more dome-shaped whereas Sheldon's was a little bit flatter.

- [Narrator] Besides hosting school kids, staff work with local residents who track turtles and then post photos they've taken in backyards, forest or on the roadside.

- My name's Branwen Nhikawa and I am a citizen or community scientist.

- [Narrator] Nhikawa and her family have contributed more than 80 shelfies to the Citizen Science Project, Turtle Checkers.

- One of the best things that we can do when we see a turtle is, first off, make sure that it is safe and away from traffic and that you're safe and away from traffic as well.

So it would be to move the turtle if it's not, and take a picture or a shelfie.

If you see a turtle, just come up nice and slow and take a couple pictures straight overhead.

[camera clicking] There, and if possible, I try to get one on the side.

[camera clicking] And there's your shelfie.

And so these pictures will be submitted to the database.

That's where the artificial intelligence will start looking at the pictures, the pattern on the shell and compare it to the other ones in the database.

- [Narrator] Shelfies submitted by citizen scientists like Nhikawa go to PWC Research Coordinator, Kaitlin Saxton.

- And then we will give those photos to someone who we're working with to develop an AI tool.

And the AI tool will basically look at two pictures and determine are these the same turtle?

- [Narrator] Working together scientists and local citizens are raising awareness- [camera clicking] About this vulnerable animal- [camera clicking] and helping it survive amid ever increasing human populations.

[camera clicking]