where did they all go?

lats week both the leatherbacks and the loggerheads were nesting really good. We were averaging two or three leatherbacks and more than eighty loggerheads each night - things were rocking! For the past two days, no leatherbacks have shown up and only a few (30-40) loggerheads have nested. I imagine the cooler water over the past few days has been keeping them away. I was lucky enough to watch the first green turtle nest on Juno Beach last night at about 2am. She crawled out of the water directly in front of me and was one the beach for a few hours digging an enormous nest.
Only a few more weeks to go this season. Stay tuned!

One turtle

A single leatherback visited the beach last night. She didn't arrive until about 2am, just as most of our guests gave up and headed to bed for the night.
"Zhang" is a turtle that we tagged a few years ago while the bright comet Ikeya-Zhang (a few images here) shone in the early morning sky. We named two leatherback that season for the comet; Ikeya and Zhang and they have both been back to nest here on Juno several times.
I like to scan the skies each morning for comets that are barely visible in the night scopes. There is currently comet that is barely visible in the early twilight hours each morning. In a few days it will be lost in the sunlight and will not be seen again for a long time. I don't think we will be naming any leatherback turtles "Comet 73P/Schwassmann Wachmann 3" this season! but if you have any good names for new turtles, leave them in the comments.
Night night!

it always happens

It seems that whenever there is one turtle on the beach, another is not far behind. Last night while we were all watching "Ara" cover her nest near on the north side of the Jupiter Reef Club, a leatherback turtle crawled up the beach and laid an unnoticed nest on the SOUTH side of the Reef Club. They always seem to do that to us! I imagine that the turtle was watching and waiting for Sara to pass by before she made the push up the beach to lay a nest. She just finished and headed back to the water by the time Sara passed on her way south to continue the survey. Oh well, the turtles do always win!

Lots of loggerhead turtles nested again last night. I had more than 65 crawls this am, and a good majority of those crawls were nests. Looks like the loggerheads are making a stand this year. Keep checking in to see how they are doing.

More tomorrow morning....

couple of leatherback and lots of loggerheads

Last night the loggerheads were nesting pretty good and I recorded more than 60 crawls this morning. We were also lucky to spot two leatherback turtles as they were crawling up the beach. The first turtle was "Reeves" We have been seeing her since 2001 and last night she nested on Singer Island at about 12am. The second girl was spotted up near the Jupiter Reef Club which is one of the few buildings along our survey area that has a seawall that protrudes out onto the beach. "Juliane" crawled up the beach and bumped in to the seawall, moved a bit to the north and found a good nesting spot just next to the wall. A few Marinelife Center volunteers , a fellow Duke Alumni of Kelly's, Kristin Hart and her boyfriend helped us with Julianne. We all watched her slip back into the water at about 3am as the moon rose from the ocean. She looked really pretty in the night scope as she disappeared.

A quiet night

Last night we had quite a few visitors at the picnic table. Chris Sasso (NOAA Fisheries) was with us to do some work with our turtles and Whitney Eure (Veterinarian from North Carolina) was in town and has never observed a leatherback. Whitney did enjoy spotting a few loggerhead turtles, but we were unable to find a single leatherback last night.
Sara and Kelly rode the beach for a while while we all chatted at the picnic table back at the office. Each of us jumped up when the phone rang, but the beach crew always started the conservation off by saying the words you hate to hear; "No turtle!" I really thought that there would be one or two last night. The loggerheads are nesting really well this season. Each day I am recording about 40 nests which is quite a bit more than last season at this time of the summer. It will be great news if the loggerheads keep it up and break the downward nesting trend of the past few years.

This week should be busy and we will have some guests out with us. Keep checking in for updates and maybe some exciting news....!

Injury images

These are a few of the images we took of Venus. Please see Kellys post below for more information.





Please remember that flash photography is not permitted on the beach during sea turtle nesting season. We have a special permit which allows us to capture images to document the condition of these turtles.

All marine turtle images taken in Florida were obtained with the approval of the U.S. Fish & Wildlife (USFWS) and the Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commision (FWC) under conditions not harmful to this or other turtles

High tide

The high tide kept us from riding south to Singer Island during the early part of the night, which is unfortunate because the leatherbacks seemed to like it down there. On my second pass south, I was able to make it past the new seawall which is being constructed on the north end of Singer. Sure enough, there was not one, but THREE leatherback nests down there! I bet Debbie Sobel and Barbara Kissas are happy this morning, but I was in a bad mood for most of the night.
I was able to find three tagged loggerhead turtles though. These girls were all nesting in macarthur park and singer island. It was interesting to note that one of them was tagged exactly two years ago.

pleasant night

The weather suprised us at about 2:30am last night when the temperature instantly dropped from 75 to 66 degrees in only a few minutes! I didn't even have my hat! Anybody who knows us or has spotted us on the beach at night know we tend to dress warmly with fleece, pants, tennis shoes and on most nights, wool hats. It really caught us off guard as we were heading north from Singer Island.

There were no leatherbacks last night. There were quite a few loggerheads, and they mostly nested on the south end of the beach. I don't think there were more than 5 crawls on the north end of the beach by sunrise, but I counted 23 on the south end.
We will be out there again tonight. Keep checking in.

single leatherback

A single leatherback showed up last night at about 10:30pm. Please listen to the audio post below for more information about her.

It was rather wierd that all but two loggerheads nested south of Mercury Way last night. I didn't see a single loggerhead on the north end of the survey area until about 4am! I was lucky enough to catch a tagged loggerhead crawling to the water at about 3am. This turtle was tagged by me on May 13th 2003 and has not been seen since. So far we have recorded 59 loggerhead nests on Juno Beach, which is about "normal" for this time of year.

Not much else to report. It looks like we might get a bit of (well needed!) rain over the next few nights and it will probably be good for capturing lighting images!!

Must be the lucky pants

Last night was a busy one! We started the night out with Kelly encountering the first turtle (Aquila) on Singer Island. She had just come up out of the water as Kelly was riding along the beach. While Kelly was waiting to check the turtles tags, Sara headed south from the Mareinelife Center and soon found another leatherback. This turtle was "Eve" and a Marinelife Center volunteer happened to see her emerge from the ocean about the same time Kelly was watching the turtle on Singer Island!

The next turtle was spotted by Sara up on Jupiter beach at about 2am, just as Kelly was heading home to bed. I headed up north in the car to meet up with Sara and the turtle. This was a new girl and she seemed pretty beat up. There were numerous cuts and scrapes along her caraapace and she had a festering wound on her right shoulder. She did not lay many normal eggs and seemed a bit uncomfortable with us while we were working with her.

I left Sara to make a run to the south expecting another turtle. I quickly packed up the ATV and not more than a few minutes later I was staring up the beach at another leatherback! This turtle was "Elaine" and she nested on Juno ten days ago along with "Eve"

The time was about 3am and there were a few more hours before sunrise, so once again I headed south. I did not have to travel very far before I spotted turtle number five - "Tallulah". I checked her out, measured her and headed south with high expectations. No more leatherbacks but I did spot a few loggerheads making their way back to the water.

I headed back to the office at about 4:30am to meet with Sara and do a bit of paperwork. By 5:30am I was back out on the beach and headed south to wait for the sunrise before I could begin the morning survey. On the way down I was suprised to see that one of the turtles was just slipping into the water before sunrise. I quickly headed down to see if the second turtle was still on the beach and I was in luck. The sky was pink and the sun was just below the horizon when she crawled in front of me and entered the calm ocean. One of my favorite sights!

As we are riding along the beach or sharing a break in my office eating cheesy snacks, we often wonder what makes the turtles nest in a certain location or at a certain time of night. I think Sara summed it up best when she called me on her way home this morning; "I know why we had so many turtles last night, I was wearing my lucky pants"
I told her to wear the pants tonight!

Quiet night - quiet season?

Last night was another quiet one on the beach. The only leatherback on the beach was scared away by a large group of people and dogs. She came up at about 2:30am on Jupiter beach crawled into a large group of people having a party on the beach!
Much of the beach is open to the public at night and most of the time the turtles are not affected by people. There are a few occasions where human activity and sea turtles just don't mix very well. Lights that shine on the beach are a no-no and many beaches have ordinances protecting turtles from such things such as flashlights and streetlights. Dogs should always be on a leash or "under strict voice control"

This morning Sandy and I strained our eyes to spot a few meteors from the eta Aquarid meteor shower and we did spot a few. They were lots more to see with the night vison scopes though!

I hope the nesting picks up soon!

Lots of people

There were tons of people on the beach last night enjoying the cool air and flat ocean. I bet that I counted more than 100 people on the north section of the beach at one point during the night!
We did encounter a single leatherback as she was completing her nest up near Carlin Park in Jupiter. The turtle was "Lucy" and she is a girl that has been nesting on our beach since (at least) 2001. We enjoyed watching her as she slipped into the calm ocean at about 1:30am.
The loggerheads have been coming up pretty good so far on the south end of the beach. Sara and I checked most of them for tags and injuries last night as they finished up laying their eggs. We were lucky enough to observe a loggerhead with the biggest head I have ever seen on a nesting female! This girl had a cranium larger than a basketball! If you have ever visited the Loggerhead Marinelife Center you probably have checked out the large skull from an adult male loggerhead. If not, check it out - because the turtle last night had a head the same size or even larger!! This morning on the last survey, I saw lots of dolphins playing in the surf just as the sun oozed out of the sea. It was a really pretty sunrise nice end to an enjoyable night.
Nighty night!

last night

Last night was awesome! I was able to encounter two leatherbacks as they were laying eggs on Juno Beach.

Waves

Last night was another tough one! The large swell and heavy winds continued all night. On our first pass, Kelly was heading south and I was running north towards the juno fishing pier when I was stopped by an enormous wave that hit a newly formed scarp and shot up in the air almost 10 feet! Called Kelly and said, time to get off the beach! We met down south and decided to survey from the road for a few hours while the tide ran out.
It was just like old times, riding A1A from Jupiter down to Singer island. We did not see any turtles though and Kelly went to bed at about 2am. Sara and I then waited for the tide and headed out to try once again on the ATV. At about 3am, we were able to make it all the way up to the Jupiter Beach Resort and down south to the boundary of MacArthur park. Unfortunately, we did pass a leatherback nest that was probably laid an hour before we arrived!
It was a tough one, and I am glad it is over. Time for bed!