Sunday, June 11th - False Crawl #05

 Nice morning on the beach - first day noticing the humidity. The tide was low, with a wide expansive beach. Another beautiful sunrise courtesy of the Canadian wild fires.

As we approached the far end of the island, a 32” crawl was discovered along the face of the first row of rocks at the jetty. It’s a small miracle it was discovered at all. Had the tide been much higher, the crawl would not have been visible. It shows up better in the photos than it looked with the naked eye. Good job Mario and Dani! 

M

 

She crawled up and travelled along the rocks for about 10 feet.  A couple areas looked like there may have been an attempt to nest, but really there was no room among the rocks for a true body pit. We probed two areas and did some digging but it was pretty apparent this wasn’t the environment for a nest. Maybe she will return tonight and find a more hospitable location. 

Waties Island performs research and management activities regarding sea turtle conservation in accordance under SCDNR Permit Number MTP500.

Photos by Mario and Kim

Saturday, June 10th - No Nesting Activity

 The weather started off a little chilly, but warmed up to be a beautiful morning. Although we did not see any turtle activity, we did see some wildlife. 

Find #1 - Two-banded Sea Star. This poor thing was left belly up in the dry sand. We put it in a tide pool just in case it was still alive. When we came back to check on it, it was alive and slowly moving!

Find #2 - Hermit Crab. This little crab found a moon snail shell to live in. It was also left behind by the tide.

Besides those pictured, we also saw an osprey, a red-tailed hawk, wood storks, great egrets, snowy egrets, maybe a tricolored egret, a deer, and a rabbit. 

Waties Island performs research and management activities regarding sea turtle conservation in accordance under SCDNR Permit Number: MTP500.

Thursday, June 8th - False Crawl #04

  Overcast with the threat of impending showers when we reached the island. Hurried up the beach and located a long 33” crawl. She crawled up at low tide to just below the high tide line, did a big loop de loop then promptly returned to the ocean. No body pit, no nesting attempt evident. Pouring with lightening by the time we completed our inspection of the scene and high tailed if off the beach.

Note this crawl shows evidence of a drag mark similar to the crawl at Nest 1 on 5-24 🔽

                                                                       5-24 crawl 🔽

 Photos by Bill C and Ayanna

Waties Island performs research and management activities regarding sea turtle conservation in accordance under SCDNR Permit Number MTP500. 

Tuesday, June 6th - still no sea turtle nesting news

Another nice morning on the beach.  We had a small group, and Sherrie brought along her granddaughter.  Started the day with spotting Wood Storks in the Marsh.

 

Wood Storks

Tuesday Volunteers heading to the jetty

 

After the recent high tides, the sand was much firmer today, but on the lower end the sand is squishy.  Grace reported there are places on the upper end that was difficult to walk on. She was surprised how far the high tide went, in places it is at the base of the dunes, and flowed following the breach in the dunes on the upper end.  The lower end continues to erode.

Deer tracks

Mother Nature's art

Lots of runnels up the beach, they were not there yesterday

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Flying Fish

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 A Flying Fish spotted on the beach today.

Text and pictures by Leslie P. - Flying Fish pictures by Grace

Monday, June 5th - No Turtle Action, but really high tide last night - Full Moon

I am sorry to say, we did not have any nesting activity last night, thought we might with the full moon and high tides.  The high tide last night came really high up on the beach, in some cases to the base of the dunes.  It was reported on the upper end of the island, the high tide flowed into the breach areas left from Hurricane Ian.  However, Nest #1 is high and  dry. 

With the higher tides, we did pick up more trash than we have in the last few weeks.

Sunrise over the marsh

The ocean came up high on the beach

June Full Moon, aka  - Strawberry Moon

Here comes the sun

Water came up high - Hog Inlet

Along with high water, lots of sea foam

And wrack

Water cutting more into the dunes

This Cannonball Jellyfish left high and dry - long way to the ocean

Looking up toward the jetty, lots of sea foam and wrack

Nest #1 - nice and dry - she picked a great place

 Waties Island performs research and management activities regarding sea to conservation in accordance under SCDNR Permit Number: MTP500.

Text and pictures by Leslie P - many thanks to Jean for the pictures of Nest #1

Saturday, June 3rd - No Sea Turtle Nesting

 Saturday morning weather for our walk was nice and cool. Although we did not find any new nesting activity, we did see some very interesting critters.

Find #1 - Whelk egg casing. I think this is an egg casing from the Knobbed Whelk, Busycon carica. Each section is filled with tiny whelks. 

Find #2 - Mermaid’s Purse. It is an (empty) egg casing of maybe a Clearnose Skate.

Find #3 - A pair of Black Scoters, a coastal diving duck.

Find #4 - Two Forbes’ Sea Stars, Asterias forbesi, both returned to the water. 

Find #5 - A Florida Horse Conch, Triplofusus giganteus. It is very interesting to see its bright orange body. If you look closely, you can see the operculum that it can use to close itself into its shell.

Lastly, Find #6 - A female Atlantic Blue Crab. In the second photo, you can see the shape of the abdomen looks sort of like the capital building and its claws are orange. Both of these indicators tell us that the crab was a female. Males have a narrower shape on the abdomen and blue claws.

Waties Island performs research and management activities regarding sea to conservation in accordance under SCDNR Permit Number: MTP500.