Finally, an inventory on Nest #10
We had a good crowd on the beach; Michelle Pate, SCDNR Coordinator for the Marine Turtle Program was doing a site visit, Dr Paul Gayes, eight members of the CCU Sea Turtle Club, most of our leads, and interested volunteers, Richard Green a videographer and Judy Johns, a photographer both from CCU. We had three truck loads heading to the beach a little after 9:00 am this morning.
This nest was laid on August 7th, the mother's crawl was 32 inches wide, and it was a shallow nest, about 12 inches deep. She wandered around a little before heading back to the ocean. As suspected, this nest did not produce any viable hatchlings. We dug up 88 eggs that had not hatched, so no emergence. There were a few broken pieces, unsure where they came from. Earlier in the season, this nest was plagued by Ghost Crabs, we lost 2 eggs to these pesky Ghost Crabs, and one egg was used for DNA - 3 plus the 88 unhatched eggs = a total of 91 eggs in this clutch. Both the Hatch and Emergence Success rate was zero.
We did open several of the discolored eggs, and many had developed hatchlings, they had the yolk sac attached. At this time, I can not give a definitive answer on why they passed before hatching, but I would guess a possible over-wash, possibly the high wave action we had when Hurricane Larry passed the South Carolina coast. From the comments I heard, I do not think the King Tide caused these deaths, I believe they perished before this event. Sad, but Mother Nature is not always kind.
After the inventory, several of us participated in an on-line class discussion with Dr Gayes, several of our volunteers took a last walk up to the long end. I gave Michelle and several students and volunteers a driving tour of the island. We all got out by the jetty and looked across to North Carolina. We picked up the walkers and headed back to the shed, we arrived back about 11:30.
The 2021 Nesting season is officially over.
Many thanks to everyone who helped with the transportation, talking to the students, assisting in the inventory, and helping to manage everything I missed.
Lots of people, like herding cats.
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| Let the digging begin . . . . |
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| First egg uncovered |
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| Nest results - 88 Unhatched Eggs |
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| Exploring what is in the eggs |
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| Michelle Pate, SCDNR |
Received more pictures, these are posted here - thanks to Melissa F
Along with the CCU Students we had Mr Richard Green and Ms Judy Johns photographing and videoing our inventory.
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| Ms Judy Johns |
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| Mr Richard Green |
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