endangered

Papa’s World – Preparing Turtle Nest for watching!

/ Tom / Leave a comment

DISCLAIMER: The work for protected Sea Turtles is authorized by the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission.

PERMIT: ST020232

The volunteers of Ocean Isle Beach are in the dozens and dozens – from walking the beach looking for

“TURTLE TRACKS” to riding an ATV along the beach and dunes looking for the distinctive large

Tractor Tire coming up out of the water – then turning around and heading back to the water.

Thus – leaving buried her nest – to be found by these said volunteers who then put in place

protections to ensure the nest is safe!

The nest has been protected against predators and here – on day number 55 – the nest watchers gather

at 7PM. every night – to 11 PM. until the baby turtles have hatched.

In this picture – the top covering has been rolled back and a miro-phone buried eight inches and covered up close to the nest.

We now are listening for activity inside the nest to give us a better idea of when to expect the turtles to hatch and emerge.

You can see the yellow line running away from the nest down to a speaker set up for listening.

As team members watch – 10 members to each team – the leader prepares to bury the microphone.

Soon the yellow wire is to be run back to where the team members have their chairs set up behind the rope-off area.

The roped-off area with team chairs and the ramp for the baby turtles extends all the way to the water.

This whole process on OIB is done by volunteers – there are currently 28 nests and each will require a team consisting of 10 members!

They are continually educating the public and children who are fascinated by this process.

Thanks for reading PAPA’S WORLD my site: livinglifedoingitmyway.blog

PAPA’S WORLD – PREPARING SEA TURTLE NEST FOR WATCHING!

Papa’s World – SEA TURTLE NEST PROTECTION!

/ Tom / Leave a comment

Disclaimer: The work for protected Sea Turtles is authorized by the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission – PERMIT: ST200232

The Sea Turtles Protection on Ocean Isle Beach is a volunteer organization.

Many – many volunteers dedicated to the Sea Turtles hatching and as many as possible reaching the waters of the Ocean.

Also – to protect TURTLE NESTS along the beach from predators and educate the public on the survival of the Sea Turtles who come to the beach to lay their eggs.

Nesting is usually done overnight – leaving huge TURTLE CRAWL TRACTS on the beach – digging a hole and laying the eggs.

The SEA TURTLE ten covers the nest, slowly crawls back to the ocean – the mother never sees the little turtles – and can lay eggs several more times.

The beach is patrolled by an ATV every morning before 5:30 am. and Beach walkers at 6am.

Nests are called in and a response team comes and verify the nest and sets up protection and takes GPS coordinates.

Female Sea Turtles only start producing eggs at the age of 25 years old –

Through DNA testing of eggs – they can be tracked all up and down the coast of N.C. – S.C. – Ga. –

and the Northern part of Florida.

They have the DNA of a daughter Turtle – its mother and its grandmother which would be at least 75 years old!

The Sea Turtles return to lay eggs all up and down the coast and sometimes come back to the same beach.

Thanks for reading and here are some pictures of the preparation to protect the nests.

Here the nest has been prepped for protection – the mesh rolled back to bury a microphone to listen to the babies moving around in the nest.

The sounds they make are then compared to several recorded sounds on an app on the leader’s phone.

You then compare the sounds to the app to try and pinpoint how many days are left before they hatch.

The team comes each night at 7PM. and sits for four hours – they will do this each night until the nest hatches.

Past data collected shows that the nest will hatch within this time frame but it can occur outside of this,

these are dedicated volunteers – it could stretch into weeks of watching and waiting!

Installing the microphone by burying it next to the nest at the same depth – it records people 50 to 75 feet away talking and moving about.

This is put down to keep foxes out of the nest – when they hatch this will be moved out of the way.

Team members listening to the sounds from the nest Thanks for reading PAPA’S WORLD –

livinglifedoingitmyway.blog

PAPA’S WORLD – SEA TURTLE NEST PROTECTION – ON OCEAN ISLE BEACH