DEL.ICIO.USFROM ATLANTA TO / ST. GEORGE ISLAND, FLA.
Turtles: Rare daytime egg-laying draws Florida crowdThe Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 08/03/08
St. George Island, Fla. — On this thin resort island in the Florida Panhandle, sea turtles are iconic creatures adored by residents and vacationers.
Visitors see stuffed toy turtles in every souvenir shop. Those renting houses and condos find signs and stickers reminding them to turn off outside lights at night so as not to disorient turtles that come ashore to lay eggs. Beach signs issue a stern warning: Disturbing a turtle nest will incur a fine, plus the wrath of the turtle-loving state government.
 SUSAN PUCKETT / spuckett@ajc.com | ||
| Her maternal duties completed, a loggerhead returns to the Gulf of Mexico. | ||
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But vacationers — or even residents — rarely see a turtle in the flesh.
Sea turtles are a threatened species that roam the seas except when they return to the site of their birth to lay eggs during nesting season, May to August. Nesting, and the hatching two months later, always happens at night, when nobody is around to watch.
Well, almost always.
I was splashing in the ocean on a hot June afternoon when my fiancée started yelling and waving me out of the water. A shark sighting?
I saw a dark lump at the spot where the waves hit the sand. Putting on my glasses, I easily made out the rounded shell of a loggerhead sea turtle.
Kids stopped building sand castles and surfcasters reeled in their lines. Everybody watched. This was something special, the Animal Planet come to life.
I moved closer to study the yellowish turtle flesh, the broad flippers, the blocky head, the big and mournful eyes. The turtle slowly moved up the beach, stopped near the dune and began to rearrange sand with her flippers, building a nest so she could lay eggs under the glare of the afternoon sun.
"It's a rare occasion," Bruce Drye, coordinator of the St. George Island Volunteer Turtlers, said of the daytime birthing.
When it comes to sea turtles, Drye, 57, is kind of like a small-town doctor who keeps up with every birth on the island.
He spent 20 years as the ranger at the state park on the island and, when he retired in 1998, took this part-time job. About twice a month he gets a call when somebody observes a turtle building a nest, usually at night.
On this day, one of the condo dwellers telephoned Drye's number, which is posted all over St. George Island. The earnest protector of sea turtles arrived in short order at the nesting site clad in his khaki volunteer turtler cap, turtle print shirt and turtle belt buckle.
I went back to the condo, got a camera and woke up my 16-year-old daughter. Word of the turtle sighting spread through the condo complex. Soon, dozens of vacationers armed with cameras surrounded the mother turtle.
Drye was pleased to see they kept a respectful distance and didn't try to shoot photos in front of her face. He'd have a receptive audience when he turned the beach into a classroom.
Drye instructed the rubberneckers to gather to one side and to move their beach chairs and umbrellas. Any obstruction could confuse the mother turtle when she headed back to the water.
Then Drye asked the vacationers to line up and slowly advance in small groups to take a closer look.
This disparate group of beach people, who minutes earlier had been drinking beer, tossing flying discs and doing their own thing under the Florida sun, obeyed like awed grade-school kids.
In twos and threes we quietly edged up to watch as the mother loggerhead, seemingly oblivious to the spectators, scraped sand over 100 or so ping-pong-ball-size eggs.
As we watched, Drye answered questions.
Q: What kind of turtle is this?
A: A loggerhead, the most common kind in the gulf. It weighs about 275 pounds and the hatchlings will be about 2 inches long. Leatherback and green sea turtles are also seen from time to time.
Q: Where did the turtle come from?
A: She was born on St. George Island and returned to this spot by instinct to lay eggs. She might lay up to three nests during the nesting season.
Q: Would she sit on the nest?
A: No. The mother would swim away and let the hatchlings fend for themselves. Another turtle volunteer will monitor the nest.
Q: What threats do sea turtles face?
A: Mainly humans. Natural predators such as crabs, birds and raccoons put the eggs at risk, but people are the big problem. For instance, outside lights can confuse adult and baby turtles and cause them to crawl toward the light, not toward the sea. People leave their sand buckets, coolers or beach chairs out overnight, which can frighten a mother turtle coming ashore and cause her to turn around.
And fireworks! Drye hates fireworks. Hungry turtles swallow the plastic casings left on the beach and that harms their insides.
That's one reason the sea turtle population is dwindling, Drye said. The creature may be reclassified from threatened to endangered.
But this year, birthing is going great guns. As of mid-July, the group had marked 137 nests on a 12-mile stretch of beach from Bob Sikes Cut to the state park. During all of 2007, only 66 loggerhead nests were counted.
"This year's numbers are higher than they have been since 2003, but no one understands why this might be," Drye said.
The spectators were thrilled. Grant Ansley, 9, of Marietta was sitting around the condo when his mother told him "something cool was happening on the beach." He rushed down to the beach and soaked up turtle teachings from Drye.
"It was really cool and a good experience because I've never seen a real sea turtle before," he said
Finally, the mother turtle finished covering the eggs with sand, pushed out of the nest and slowly moved toward the water. She paused at the waterline until surf washed over her, pushed off with her flippers as the wave pulled back into the Gulf of Mexico and disappeared into the dark green water. She'd been the center of attention for about 30 minutes.
The beachgoers applauded and slowly transitioned back into their condo existence.
Drye hammered a temporary warning sign into the sand, planted some small plastic flags, answered a few more questions and went home. He'd left newly purchased groceries on the kitchen counter when he'd gotten the call.
We finished our week at the beach. One night we saw teenagers shooting fireworks over the ocean. Instead of admiring the bright explosions, I thought about the plastic and cardboard that might end up on the sand or in the ocean. I hoped the kids would pick up their debris.
Turtles move slowly. Attitudes can change in an afternoon.
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