Wednesday, August 19th - Nest 07 Emerges

 Another hot, humid morning with the sunrise around 6:30 am we started our monitoring duties.  Very little breeze and the ankle biting black flies were terrible today.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nest #07 was laid on June 22nd and was left as is, so this is called an "in situ" nest.  This nest emerged on Day 58.  There was another nest laid on the same day, Nest #06R which was recently inventoried and this nest emerged on Day 53.  It will be interesting to see the results of this nest compared to Nest #06R.  Comparing a Relocated Nest to an In Situ Nest.  The hatchlings may of timed their emergence with the high tide last night, which was at 1:23 am.  All hatchling tracks ended at the high tide line or just below where the tide line had receded.  

  

Lots of Hatchling Tracks

The hatchlings emerged from a small hole at the base of the reed marking the nest.  There is a larger Ghost Crab hole present also, but only a few hatchling tracks in this area.  Looks like the majority of the hatchling were leaving on the left side and possibly the Ghost Crab was coming in on the right side to check them out.  We did check the Ghost Crab hole and no one was home.

 

Emergence Hole is located to the 

left of the DNR pole - looking down 

at the nest 

Ghost Crab hole is larger 

and to the right of the DNR pole 

Ghost Crab hole

The hatchling tracks were spread over a large area of the beach, many tracks headed south before going toward the ocean.  The Wednesday Volunteers checked carefully all tracks and Ghost Crab burrow holes, thankfully we did not find any that did not make it to the ocean.

 

 

Tracks were very spread out

Jackie and the other Volunteers tracking the hatchling tracks

Some tracks headed south before going toward the ocean

 

 

 

 

 

This nest is located about midway up the island and a Saturday Inventory will be scheduled.

Narrative by Leslie, Pictures by Leslie, Jackie and Kate

 All sea turtle monitoring by the Waties Island Sea Turtle Monitoring Program is permitted and authorized by SCDNR under Permit MTP500.