It's September, the time of year when yet another generation leaves the nest.  But humans aren't the only ones experiencing this rite-of-passage.  Saturday morning at the Wareham Community Gardens, humans offered their support during this bittersweet time to 18 painted turtle hatchlings who were sent off into the world after a summer spent soaking up the warmth of the sun.

Turtle researchers Don Lewis and Sue Wieber Nourse, along with over a dozen curious supporters, released the 1-inch-long hatchlings into the grassy shore of a pond behind the garden.  The hatchlings scattered in all directions, and will spend the next few months searching for the perfect mud in which to dig a snug burrow for the winter.

"Only about 1 in 1,000 eggs survive to become hatchlings," said Lewis.  "So we're giving these guys a great start."

They were quite cute little buggers.  And strong.  It was amazing how easily they could propel themselves out of your hand with only their short, mushroom-stem legs.

"They have to be able to move through mud that's like concrete," explained Lewis.

Wieber Nourse added that painted turtles' are also speedier than most turtles, helping them evade predators.

Lewis and Wieber Nourse also brought some hatchlings of other species of turtles for comparison. (The hatchlings were not released, however, because they prefer different habitats.)

Eastern box turtles are "species of special concern," in Massachusetts, and the hatchlings have a much more pronounced "spine" along their shells.  This species favors upland wooded areas.

Diamondback terrapins have a brownish shell, and they are a marine species that spends its young life in saltwater marshes and dunes.  They are a threatened species, and they were nearly extirpated (made locally extinct) along the eastern seaboard because of human's fondness for turtle soup, Nourse Wieber said.  In fact, Lewis said that "terrapin" comes from an Algonquin Indian word for "good eating."

Perhaps the coolest moment, however, was when Lewis pulled out a box-turtle egg that was hatching!  As the hatchling fell out into his hand, you could see how his shell had been curved by the egg.

If the released turtles survive to adulthood, we're likely to see the females of the group again.  Female turtles lay their eggs at the same site where they themselves hatched. And Wieber Nourse said that it's not quite certain how long turtles live, but scientists believe that they can live up to a century.  Like the growth rings of a tree, turtles add a "scute" around the patterns on their shell.  Some species lose these rings after reaching a certain age, (yes it sounds enviable, but it is a result of continuously scraping their shells through mud and gravel not a life a luxury or some wonder-chemical) but Wieber Nourse and Lewis have an adult turtle they've studied for the last 30 years and is doing just fine, they said.

So the scientists are optimistic that some members of this year's "crop" will reappear once they reach adulthood and are ready to lay eggs of their own.