Monday, May 30th - Memorial Day - Nest #3

 A beautiful Monday morning on the beach, cool and a beautiful sunrise.  We did not walk far before we saw the crawl, right after M3, very close to the horse entrance on the beach.  This is a textbook crawl and nesting site.  Since this was the first crawl and nest for our new volunteer Jo Ann,  Leslie made it into a training session for all.  We also welcomed back Sherry to our volunteers, she was able to walk since school is not in session.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 She came in and crawled up an incline and nested on a flat area above the wrack line.  The nesting site had the crescent shaped sand and thrown sand.  Thankfully, we found the nest chamber without too much probing - Leslie and Erin both probed.  Jo Ann assisted in removing the sand to get the first egg for our DNA specimen.  The nest was very shallow, only about 6 inches deep.  Leslie was surprised she did not puncture one of the eggs with the probe. When she returned to the ocean, she went right over her incoming tracks.

 

Shallow Nest

Jo Ann getting to handle the egg

Monday Volunteers

Crossing out the crawl marks

 The volunteers could not get around the short end & there was nothing new on the long end. There was very little trash and no signs of animal tracks but the heat with no breeze brought a lot of bugs.  We spotted several examples of Sea Pork that were on the beach.

Many thanks to those who have served and supported our country.  Have a fun and enjoyable Memorial day with family and friends.

Sunday, May 29, 2022 Nest 2R plus 2 False crawls

 Started out humid and very foggy.  We were walking  past  M6 when this long crawl was spotted.

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  She crawled up the dune then headed back down to where she

  laid her nest.  

She laid her nest in the very dark sand and went straight down to the water.Small turtle, crawl measure was 32".

 

After probing for some time, Kim found the nest, which had a total of 103 eggs.  Because the nest was so shallow (7" deep) one  egg was broken during probing. It was used  for the  DNA sample.

Nest #2R  (R because we relocated it)

The original nest was laid  not far from M6.  Kim chose to move it 50' closer to M6, and because of the high tides on Waties chose a higher spot on the dune.

 

   False crawl up past M #7.  This crawl is 35", so we had two different ladies on the beach.  She went up, hit a dune and turned right around.

Third crawl  right up past second crawl.  Because this crawl also  measured 32", we think it is FC for our nesting turtle.  She came right up  went right back down, no body pit or thrown sand.  

 Very proud of the Sunday team!  They did a great job today with heat, humidity, fog and tide coming in.  Special thanks to Barb for supplying one of the pictures and for Leslie coming out to help.

  

 

                                                                         

 

 

 

 

Wednesday 5/25/2022 NEST #1

We were lucky.  Weather was cool and cloudy.  We met some mosquitoes in the parking area only. Noticed just a few deer tracks on the beach and picked up very little trash.

Walkers could not make it around the lower end this a.m. due to the tide.

Between MM 3 and MM 4 we spotted a crawl and a text book nest site.  We continued our walk and notified the other walkers  that we had a possible nest and would meet them there.

We measured the crawl at 32 inches.  Don't believe we missed our turtle by much because according to the "Tides Near Me" app, Dunn Sound High Tide was 4:47 a.m.  Allowing for an hour Ebb Tide, the tide turned around about 5:45 a.m. and we got to the beach parking by six and still needed to walk up the beach.

Teaching the art of probing 

Yahooooo!!!! we have our first a nest of the season!

Our mother turtle placed her nest at a great location, above the King Tide line at the base of the dune.

Congratulations Wednesday Walkers!

Pictures: Valerie, Phylliis & Theresa

 

Tuesday, May 24th False Crawl #2

 An interesting morning! Bill walked the short end and I walked with Sherrie on the long end. Not much sun but the breeze was pleasant.  

We get almost to MM#7 and there is a crawl.  High tide was around 3 AM.  The track was very short and no V.  The going and coming track was almost on top of one another. Also the same length due to the tide.  The width was 77 cm or 30.3 inches.  Could this be a newbie?

We walk up to the perfect pit laid up in the dune above the high tide line and Bill says, "What?"  I'm behind him not seeing the hole and wondering what was going on.  She dug about an 18" deep hole and then left.  No tracks around the nest so she wasn't spooked by animal. 

Bill probed all around and found no other places that suggested she dug again there.  Bill dug in the bottom of the hole but after some soft sand he hit solid sand.  

We had never witnessed a nest where the turtle dug and then did not lay her eggs.  New territory for us.   We now have 2 False Crawls - maybe tomorrow.

And then there was Waties beauty...

This one has me singing, "Starry, starry night..."
Love that sky!

Sunday, May 22,

 Unfortunately no nest. 

 Lovely morning with a very low tide, so we could walk almost to the end of the jetty.  Cloudy day so that made for an enjoyable walk.  Just sharing some of our lovely sights at upper end.

  We thought we had been transported to the coast of Ireland!

Sunday team

Wednesday 5/18/22

 Beautiful Morning!  It was 61 degrees with little to no wind as I left my house before sunrise this morning.  As we got to the beach the sun was just coming up.  First thing I noticed was how high the wrack line was from the high tides we had had a couple of days ago. Around the same time as the lunar eclipse on the 15th

You can see in the pictures above how close to the dunes the wrack line is.  It was like this all the way up the beach. At the upper end, the wrack line was at the base of the dunes.  Not much beach for nesting with these high tides.

The lower end of Waties at Hog Inlet as of this morning at about mid tide.

Pictures: Theresa K. & Valerie W.

Monday, May 16th No Sea Turtle Action, high tides

 Happy Monday! We had a great walk this morning. Started out seeing the setting full moon over the marsh.  When we got to the beach the tide line was very high but we made it all the way to the jetty.

Our short end volunteers could not get around the point due to the high water. There was quite a bit of trash & lots of deer tracks. We said the animals had a beach party under the full moon last night!  The tracks of Saturday's False Crawl were still visible, which were of interest to our new volunteer.

Some of our beach findings were a new bucket was recovered, it will be washed up and stored in the shed. We recovered the black dock bumper and Leslie has possession of this find.  We saw Semipalmated Plovers on the beach and the volunteers on the lower end also experienced some plover activity.  We got to see the graceful flight of the pelicans.

We had a guest this morning, we welcomed Heather, Janice's daughter who lives in Scotland and a deer welcomed us back to the mainland.

 Pics by Leslie and Erin

Setting Full Moon

Sunrise on the beach

Wrack was high on the beach

Tide pushing into one of the breaches

Wrack line around Marker 8

The Jetty

The jetty

 

 

Soaring Pelicans

 

Doe welcoming us back