Thursday Inventory #12

As we did our walk before the inventory there were some items of interest.  #8 nest which we suspect may have emerged already had a shell on the surface.  The days after a depression was seen there was rain and we have never seen hatchling tracks as evidence of an emergence.

Number 10 also had a depression earlier in the week.  There is a large hole at the reed but the consensus was that it was a ghost crab hole.  Because of the heavy rain yesterday there was no evidence of hatchling tracks.

Our team had found this nest so we were very interested to see what it contained. It is the nest that is up on a ledge. Roger and Jane Ellen who had never dug before went at it with the help of Kinsey.  The nest contained many roots. We found 2 eggs on the surface before we began to dig (considered hatched since after emergence), 97 hatched eggs in the nest,  5 pipped eggs, and 17 unhatched eggs. With the egg taken for research the total came to 122 eggs.

It was a hot, windy day.  The eggshells kept wanting to blow away. Yet as always the beauty of Waties shone through.