BRADENTON BEACH – The nest laid by a loggerhead sea turtle that was struck and killed by a car on Gulf Drive in June hatched earlier this week, producing 84 hatchlings.
“When we conducted the nest excavation, we found one live hatchling in the nest, which was released immediately,” Anna Maria Island Turtle Watch and Shorebird Monitoring Executive Director Kristen Mazzarella wrote in an Aug. 23 email.
Mazzarella said it was a great hatch success and is hopeful that the turtle’s legacy will continue.
“At this nest, which was situated in the picnic area of Coquina Beach near lifeguard tower 6, we placed a dedication plaque to let people know how, thanks to the awareness this turtle brought about lighting issues, many more turtles were saved from her fate,” she wrote.
After her death, the streetlights that led the turtle into the road were turned off until a turtle-safe solution could be put in their place.
MANY NEST EXCAVATIONS
There have been no new crawls this week, but Mazzarella said they are possible at this time of year.
“What we have been doing a lot of is nest excavations on nests that should’ve hatched around the time of Tropical Storm Debby,” she wrote. “When nests reach 70 days, they are considered overdue and we try our best to do an inventory on them. This is sometimes a difficult task because we don’t know exactly where the nest is without the benefit of a depression from a hatch.”
Volunteers must dig the area within the nest stakes to find the nest chamber. Sometimes, Turtle Watch volunteers may find unhatched eggs that have stopped developing or hatched shells indicating that a hatch occurred but went unnoticed due to inundation from the storm.
“The good news is that we are finding that many of these nests did indeed hatch,” she wrote. “This is reflected in the increase in hatched nest numbers over last week.”
HATCHLING RESCUE
Turtle Watch volunteer Kathy Noonan found and rescued two loggerhead hatchlings that had fallen into a hole left on the beach.
“One of the many hazards we educate the public about is holes dug in the sand,” Mazzarella wrote. “These holes can entrap hatchlings on their way to the water and, unless they are found by someone, they may perish in the hole from dehydration or be picked up by a predator.”
With the loss of more than 180 nests to Tropical Storm Debby, it is even more important to make sure the remaining hatchlings make it to the Gulf, she said, reminding beachgoers to fill in holes in the sand before leaving the beach for the day.
