This week we had students from the University of Central Michigan on our surveys. It's a pretty hot slog in the Florida heat and humitidy for folks who aren't used to it! You can see Debbie on the right in the blue hat showing them the difference between the turtle tracks and a nest.

Here she's showing Shelley how to fill out a hatch report where we've dug up a nest to get a count of how many hatchlings made it out. We count the egg shells from the ones who made it, the unfertilized eggs, and the dead hatchlings (if any).

The photo album this week features on of the Green turtle stragglers. This one was the last turtle out, who we found while excavating a nest. Her egg must have been at the very bottom, so she got a lift up and out to the sea.

The Greens look different from the Loggerheads. In this picture you can see Debbie holding her up so the students can see her white belly.

Here's a closeup.

Photos 5 through 9 in the album show her progress until she finally makes it into the surf. This one seemed attracted to every obstacle along the way, and made several attempts to broach the surf, being beaten back several times along the way. In this shot you can see her impact into the foam. The turtles are so little, the slightest wave sends them flying.

We've had such severe dune erosion and so many nests destroyed that we're all just praying that we won't get hit by a hurricane this year. This shot shows a turtle who searched in vain for a way up the dune to next -- it's a false crawl -- she gave up and went back to the sea.

We were able to find a nest in the escarp which we relocated high on the dune. This one had only a few eggs exposed to the elements and hadn't been predated when we discovered it, so we were able to dig it out of the escarp and relocate it -- 130 eggs in all. We hope they'll eventually hatch.

Not all clutches are so lucky. This nest was probably partially exposed by the high tides and then and dug up by some kind of animal, probably by Fatty the racoon or another predator (crows, iguanas, herons, dogs, the list goes on). The turtles weren't quite ready to hatch, so you can see their remains along with the broken eggs. That's what happens in nature. Hatchlings have a very high mortality rate, and not very many of them survive to adulthood.

One of the problems we have on Singer Island is iguanas. Some idiot released a pair of them, and now the island is overrun. They have no natural predators themselves, and they eat the turtle eggs and hatchlings. When they're young they're bright green so they blend in with the trees, as shown here.

The hazard to sea turtles from humans goes beyong sea walls which prevent turtles from nesting. Other pressures, such as the thoughtless release of iguanas, pose additional perils. Currently Florida is having problems with many non-native species pushing out native species, such as pythons in the Everglades or lionfish on the reef (I saw one while out scuba diving--they're native to the Pacific and are only here because another idiot dumped them from an aquarium). Once these non-native species start reproducing, they're very hard to eradicate. A study is currently being made, and hopefully something will soon be done to cull the iguanas. Eradicating them completely is probably not possible.