About 800 sea turtle nests along northern Palm Beach County beaches were lost to Hurricane Matthew, experts at the Loggerhead Marinelife Center said.
But during a record-breaking year for nesting, the impact is minimal, experts said.
Nearly 15,000 nests already have hatched along the 10-mile stretch of beach monitored by Loggerhead. That represents a 92 percent success rate for the season.
About 1,250 nests — mostly green turtle nests — weren’t hatched before the hurricane, meaning 63 percent of them were lost to the storm, according to Sarah Hirsch, the center’s data manager.
About 450 nests are still incubating, she said.
Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission regulations bar officials from moving nests, even with the threat of a hurricane, because the eggs are prone to movement-induced mortality.
Winds have minimal impact on the nests, as the eggs are buried under the sand. However, storm surge, and subsequent beach erosion, can leave nests exposed and lower their chances of surviving.
Sea eggs can be seen along the beaches in Matthew’s aftermath, but most of those Hirsch has seen already have hatched or weren’t viable when the storm exposed them.
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