NMB Sea Turtle Nest #3

 What an exciting start to 2022 nesting season

Protected Sea Turtle Nest # 3

As Sundays STP Volunteers are out walking at sunrise, covering their segments looking for any signs of a Sea Turtle nest, Corrina was looking up the beach and spotted what she thought was a crawl. Excited,  she ran to see, YES a nice big crawl coming from the ocean, a very distinctive body pit and a nice big crawl back to the ocean. Corrina immediately called Permit holder Linda Mataya, who soon arrives along with other STP volunteers.

  

Flipper mark in sand as turtle makes a wide turn after finishing laying eggs and returning to the water

A close up picture of the crawl, The V shapes in the sand will identify the direction she is coming from and going to.

Probing is soon started, Chuck is able to find the egg cavity,  Linda carefully digs, the eggs are found.  

Because the nest is in an unsafe part of the beach, just about the HTL but in the middle of the wide, busy beach, the eggs  are carefully  relocated  back, at bottom of the dunes. 136 eggs were found, 1 used for DNA testing 135 were relocated to a safer part of the beach.

Not a common thing to find was a spacer egg, very small non-viable egg. While Loggerhead Sea Turtle eggs are about the size of a ping pong ball this is very small in comparison

A very big thank you to Corrina calling in this nest and  to all NMB Sea Turtle Volunteers who came to help.

NMB NEST #3

Thank you Corrina and Chris for the pictures.

PLEASE NOTE THAT SEA TURTLES ARE FEDERALLY AND STATE PROTECTED. 

If  in NMB or Briarcliff areas please call the NMB STP hotline immediately

Permit holder Linda Mataya

1-843-213-9074