A Nest On Every Beach

This morning was the first that we overslept, sort of.  The alarm went off at 4:45, and I hit the snooze, which is customary.  Steve woke me up at 5:35.  Not too late, but late enough to have to scarf down cereal.  Not having enough time to make coffee, I made us some tea, with the added benefit of half & half and sugar.  Steve packed up the Mule quickly, with extra screens, stakes, and posts, expecting another busy morning.  We also packed in Steve's bicycle!  This is our greatest addition to the sea turtle patrol.  With the mule loaded to capacity, tea in hand, and new snazzy clear safety glasses, I drove us off down Main Road.  It was such a treat to be able to see!

We arrived on North Beach and Steve hopped out.  He took his bike across the creek and we headed our separate ways.  I passed the two new nests near the road and expected something to show up rather quickly.  The first crawl wasn't too far off.  Her tracks lead far down the wet sand telling me that she was a late arrival, since high tide was at 2:30 AM.  I peeked at the nest, figured it was safe, and continued up the beach.  The same high tide can also make finding nests more difficult if the turtle nests early in the night.  Her tracks will only be seen in the dry sand.  I was driving close to the eroding myrtles when something caught my eye as I drove past.  I turned back and looked more closely.  Some tracks were there, and she dug a body cavity, and what looked like an attempt at a nest cavity.  The area she dug was bordered by dead shrubby trees and the high tide.   One of the worst locations possible for a nest.  I decided to continue on to survey the rest of the beach.  Not too much farther was another crawl, on a washover fan.  This crawl was very similar to the last in that she dug a body pit and started a nest cavity.  Again, I planned to revisit it after the survey was complete.  Steve radioed to tell me he found a nest on the very north tip where we store the bike and extra screens.  He worked it up as I continued north, delicately traversing the mine field of horseshoe crabs.  I made it to the end of the beach, pulled out the binder and prepared to check on the incubating nests on my return.  Every nest was safe.  The nest we relocated yesterday by the raccoon tracks did have fresh tracks around and loose sand from the raccoon on the screen.  I'm not too worried though, because we're told the raccoons only think to reach through the screens, not to dig around.  They're smart, but not smart enough.  

By the time I reached Steve, he had found the nest and pulled one egg.  We took all the equipment across the creek.  I completed the paperwork and Steve covered the nest.  We're still feeling lucky that the first nest on North Middle was at the very northern tip.  He completed the round trip in 20 minutes, saving at least 40.  We crossed the creek back to the Mule and headed back to visit the three crawls I had.  Without too much writing, they were the same situation.  All three had abandoned nest cavities.  We spent a little bit of time probing to be sure.  Each site was different in sand composition, height, and distance to the water.  It really makes us wonder why some are abandoned when they seem like good locations.

We made the drive south and I hopped out for the kayak.  I arrived at the ATV and noticed for the second morning a Wilson's Plover.  The first morning it did a broken wing display, characteristic of a nearby nest.  Perhaps one morning I'll locate the nest to make sure we don't harm it.  I hit the beach and not 20 feet south I saw my first Wilson's Plover chick (not my photo).  It was so tiny.  A miniature version of its parents.  We'll have to allow them some more room when we drive the ATV.  My long drive on South Middle didn't turn up any turtle activity, but I received another call from Steve telling me that he found a nest that needed to be relocated.  He did all the work himself as I finished my patrol.  I drove extra slowly to kill time and picked up 17 balloons.  Eventually I got word from Steve that he was done with his nest and finishing his patrol.  I met him back at the Mule and he told me about the nest.  It was located on a scarped area of erosional pine forest.  He said there was no crawl, basically the turtle climbed up some sea wrack and laid the nest.  Steve also said that had it not been for an old sea turtle screen from last year, he might have missed it.  We're told that experts miss 7% of nests, so we're bound to miss something.  He's really getting good at this.

We came home and lounged around.  I took a nap in the back yard and Steve tinkered with the internet that's been giving us some problems.  A little later we decided to tackle the shed.  It was scary in there.  There was a lot of old tools, rusty screws, junk, and it thick with cobwebs.  After a few hours of labor, it looks much better.  We finally have space to store stuff.  We also found some cool stuff.  This place is all about found objects.  We hauled the trash to the dumpsters and the other stuff still sits in the yard waiting to be hosed off.  Another chore checked off the list.  We rounded off the night with dinner, data entry, first aid kit repacking, and the creation of two patrolling kits as it's become evident that most beaches will have some activity every day.  We need to start completing our own nest work alone if it can be to save time.  Since we don't think we'll be getting another Mule any time soon, we need to shave time however we can.

I found this story yesterday and wanted to share it.  We're very worried about the oil spill, and new data shows it seeping into the loop current, and therefore threatening everything along the gulf stream.