by Jackie Orsulak
Page 1 : Early Loggerhead Nest
Members of NEST (the Network for Endangered Sea Turtles) are absolutely thrilled with the beginning of the 2010 sea turtle nesting season on the Outer Banks of North Carolina. We have started off with a really big bang! We have already had two female sea turtles lay nests on our beaches. This is the earliest nesting here in about seven years.
And, what special nests they have been. ATV driver Tom Chisholm came across a mother loggerhead still covering up her eggs on the beach early in his ride. It is always special when you get to see the mother. It is so unusual. After carefully and thoroughly covering her eggs, she crawled to the water’s edge, put her head down and plunged into the big wave. The nest was in a safe place so we did not move the eggs; of course, this also means that we do not know how many eggs are in the nest. A loggerhead laid a nest at this same place two years ago and she too was seen early in the morning. Perhaps it was the same turtle. Loggerheads can lay one to six nests in a season, but then will not nest for two to three years.
Researchers from the University of Georgia are examining the DNA of nesting loggerhead sea turtles on the Atlantic coast. In the past we have supplied them with an unhatched egg at nest excavation. They have found that the DNA can deteriorate during incubation, so now we are giving them one egg when we first discover the nest. We hate to sacrifice even one egg, but the researchers will learn so much from it. By the end of the season we can use the DNA information to know when and where this mother turtle came ashore to lay other nests (hopefully in the area that we patrol). If she comes in to nest two to three years later, we will again know if it is the same turtle. She will probably remain within a mile of the shore this season, and will hopefully come ashore again in 12 to 15 days to lay another nest. This could be a really big year for us.
Next Page : A Rare Kemp's Ridley Nest
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