It was a cool morning as the Sunday volunteers walked onto the beach. Dani & Elissa walked the short end, while Erin, Tammy, Karen and Billie Jo walked the long end. The beach was very flat all the way to the jetty. Billie Jo started the day by saying she hoped we got to see tracks for Mothers Day. She definitely got her wish! We found not one set of tracks, but two! The first set of tracks were small, about 30 inches wide, with a squiggly line in the middle of the tracks. These tracks did not have any thrown sand or crescent shape, so it became False Crawl #1.
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| The outgoing tracks with the beautiful sunrise background |
While Erin recorded data, she told the others to continue to walk. She caught up to them because they stopped when they found another set of tracks and the group told Erin that these tracks went over the dune. After following the tracks, it did not look like there was an obvious place that this turtle laid her nest. She crawled from the ocean to the base of the dune, threw some sand, and turned back toward the water. Suddenly, she made a sharp turn back towards the dune, climbed on top of the dune, slid down the back, and turned back around and crawled back to the ocean.
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| Small amounts of thrown sand, the only area that looked like there could be a nest. |
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| Starting to crawl back to the ocean, but she changed her mind. |
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| Coming back to the beach side of the dune. |
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| And finally tracks back to the water. |
Erin measured the tracks and noticed they were the same width as the first set of tracks, 30 inches wide, and had the same squiggly mark.
Erin called Leslie, because it was hard to tell if she laid a nest or not. After Ern and Leslie both probed, with no luck finding the nest cavity, this was marked as Possible Nest #1.
The Sunday crew was very happy to have Leslie to drive us back to the beach entrance after an exciting morning and first experiences for most of the Sunday team. It was a great Mothers Day walk and just like that we have activity on the island for the 2024 season!
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| Sunday's team thankful for a ride in Leslie's truck back to the entrance. |
Narrative and photos by Erin.
Waties Island performs research and management activities regarding sea turtle conservation in accordance with SCDNR Permit Number MTP500
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