Lucky 8 on Waties Island

As a group of 8 set up camp Friday night August 29th at Nest#2r someone was checking for a change in the depression of the nest every few minutes. The Muller's went to check the Nests on the west end of the Island while Nancy and Sandy went to check Nest #4 on the East end of the Island. Matt Ruby, his two cute daughters Mary and Maddie and Karen Fox stayed to watch Nest#2R. Soon we were all back together at Nest#2. After a few hours had passed Mary, her dad Matt and Karen went to check the West end again. We checked each Nest one by one stopping at Nest#3 which has two large Ghost Crab holes inside the cage right near the marker. With nothing new to report we headed back to rejoin the group at Nest#2R. While walking back as we approached Nest 1R we were greeted by 8 or 9 baby turtles. Matt and Mary stayed there to keep an eye on the babies and Karen went to get the rest of the group and her camera! We got back to the nest in time to watch the turtles trying to make their way out of the nest to the ocean. It seemed like Turtles were everywhere when in reality we really saw only about 25 at the most. It was a very dark starry night without the light from the moon the turtles navigated towards the lights on Cherry Grove Beach. We each did our part with our flashlights and my trusty lantern by the waters edge to help them find their way. One turtle was just lying in the sand just a few feet from the nest picking his head up now and again but not really getting anywhere. Nancy carried him to the waters edge where that baby still seemed not to move his or her tiny flippers at all. Nancy finally placed the turtle in the water in hopes it would be able to make that long journey with the others. A few of the turtles made it down the beach had to swim across a small tidal pool then get going again across the beach to the ocean. While all of this was happening two baby turtles remained trying to climb out of the nest and eventually did. The Muller's went home Maddie went right back to sleep and We kept watch on the nest for another 90 minutes but nothing else happened. We knew since it was a nest that was relocated to Waties from North Myrtle Beach that the nest had 129 eggs . We thought that the rest of the turtles may come out later in the night into the early morning hours. On the way driving home i thought that maybe they had all made their way to the ocean prior to Matt, Mary and I finding them but which ever is the case we wish them all a safe journey. It was an awesome experience for all! posted by Chuck and Karen Fox.

TGIF'ers SURPRISE!! #2 Hatching on WATIES ISLAND

8/29/08 7:00 am Friday!

TGIF'ers early morning observation of nests 'stamped' a Happy Smile on their faces.

Yes, the TGIF team witnessed our second hatching of the 2008 season, on Waties Island, always an exciting discovery for our teams of walkers.

Checking Nest #2R NMB, showed 2 holes, inside the cage, revealing

(from the 2 holes )several small tracks leading out, toward the direction of the ocean,

ending shortly at the high tide line, only a short distance from the cage.

Barb and Steve were contacted, arriving, as always, ASAP!!!!!!!

Guessing, these hatchlings made their debut 8/29/08 (Day 62) sometime

between 1 AM and 6 AM!!!

Nature continues to be AMAZING and full of WONDER!!!!
Nest #2R NMB, is the relocation of 148 eggs (6/28/08) from the Cherry Grove beach area. Waties Island has a total of 5 relocated nests from the NMB area, #'s 1R, 3R, 4R and 5R NMB are wait-listed! #1R NMB appearing near!!!

There are 13 Waties nests (#1 and #2 hatched and inventoried)... bringing our total '08 nests,

at this time @18!!!!

Night walks are exciting surprises awaiting all!!!
Even though there were several turtle tracks, it does not appear to be all 148!!

Yes, our daily visiting ghost crabs were there, too!

Wish we knew how to curb their appetite!!!

Gazing into the larger hole.....early am.......guessing,....... there are signs of 'turtle' activity still to surprise us!!!!
Team present: Ardie/Larry P., Cathy T., Penny A., and Karen Fox, Nancy M., and Barb/Steve D.

Posted by Nancy M.

p.s. This is the hatchling from Nest NMB R1 that we rescued from the clutches of a ghost crab on Friday morning. We set it on the way to the water.

Portuguese Man of War on the Beach

Recently, Portuguese Man of War animals (aka as Blue Bottles in Australia and New Zealand) have been washing up on the beach on Waties Island. The sting of the tentacles is quite painful, so give them a wide berth.

National Geographic says that it is not a jellyfish: They write that "The Portuguese man-of-war is a siphonophore, an animal made up of a colony of organisms working together."

See more information at the link below.

http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/invertebrates/portuguese-man-of-war.html

Thanks to Nancy M for the photo.

Barb and Steve

Saturday Morning Crawl with the Lifelong Learners

Who thought we'd see another crawl? It's getting pretty late in the season, but Charlie and Linda Mataya and Karen Fox discovered a short crawl on the lower end of the island this morning. Karen Fuss had a group of Lifelong Learners coming out, so instead of probing right away, we waited until her class could witness the process. We had visitors from Surfside to Little River and everywhere inbetween, including a wonderful little 6 year old.

But things were not to be: we probed and probed, removed sand, probed and probed, removed sand and probed, but no eggs could be found. We've labeled this False Crawl #6. Maybe tomorrow?? I hope so.

We did find what appears to be a fox den on the lower end but no foxes in just then. On the way back to the van, one of the Lifelong Learners actually saw our fox sitting up in the old beach cabana. This must be her shady daytime lookout. She didn't stick around for photos.

Now if only Nest 3 would hatch...

Barb and Steve

And The Turtles Keep Coming!

Monday, August 18th, 2008 brings yet another turtle to lay her nest on Myrtle Beach. Marcy (Coastal Carolina intern) and Karen Fox(volunteer from Waties Island) set out at 5:30 a.m. to check the beach. I never anticipated the possibility that we may find that a turtle would have nested there last night. As Marcy and I chatted she told me about the two recent false crawls so I began to have hope that we may find a nest. And find a nest we did. At the very end of our patrol at 82nd street there was the remains of a crawl and the nest. Bingo! As Marcy and I prepared to relocate the eggs to Myrtle Beach State Park, 2 women out strolling on the beach came over to see what was going on. It was their first time vacationing at Myrtle Beach and had never seen a turtle nest. They had several questions and I was extremely impressed with how patient Marcy was with them. While working, she still made time to explain what they were observing. Once the eggs were secured in the bucket we were off to give them a new home. I have some very good friends, The Munley's visiting from New Jersey and since they were staying right down the road from the park I asked Marcy if it would be ok for them to come and watch the relocation. Again Marcy was extremely accommodating and took the time to answer all their questions while getting those turtles into their new home. It was an exciting morning for me, The Munley's and those two women out for a stroll. A special thank you to Marcy for all her help! GREAT INTERN!

posted by chuck & Karen Fox

Inventory Results from Nest #2

Another beautiful morning on Waties!

This morning, we conducted an inventory of the contents of Nest #2 which hatched back on Monday. After all that rain yesterday, the sand was wet and heavy on the surface and it took a bit of digging just to get the cage off the nest. Digging down was tough too: this nest had several extra inches of sand that had drifted over it since being laid back in June. There were 48 hatched eggs and 9 unhatched eggs. In addition, this nest had 12 eggs lost to the fox back when it was laid. As far as numbers go, it was on the small side compared to our results from last year.









We also had a report of large cat?? tracks on the upper end of the island above Marker 7 which was exciting! To see more details, click on the photo.













Barb and Steve

Hatching Season is Underway

This morning, the Snyders and their family were walking the upper end of the island. Just as they were checking Nest #2, they realized there were many small tracks leading in every direction from the cage with many of the tracks going away from the ocean and into the dunes. It seems that a fox must have gotten to them as they were hatching. Nancy and Barb came out to check the nest and found that a good number of the hatchlings were misoriented – they crawled out of the nest and went behind the primary dunes. They followed the backside of the dune line for a long way. Unfortunately, lots of fox tracks there too. Two dead hatchlings were found.

The rest of the tracks led toward the ocean – hope we had some survivors here!

On Thursday morning, we will be doing an inventory of this nest. Hope our Thursday walkers will be able to join us. Keep checking those nests; hatching season is underway!

Many thanks to Dick and Carol, as well as Beth and Bob Minut (their daughter and son-in-law) and their grandchildren, Melanie, Alex and Noelle.

Necropsy Results on July 28 Stranding

Kelly Sloan, an intern working for the SC Department of Natural Resources, came up to NMB on July 28 to pick up our stranded turtle. She took the loggerhead back to Charleston and ran some tests to try to determine the cause of death. The more they learn about these animals, the better they understand the causes of illness and mortality. This was what she wrote:

"We did a necropsy of the Waites turtle at the aquarium and the consensus was that the initial boat trauma led to a slow death in this immature female. The veterinarian guessed that the prop wounds were at least a few weeks old. She was emaciated but had been eating horseshoe crab and blue crab. Other than that, there wasn’t much else to note."

No hatchings overnight, but it was a beautiful morning on the beach!

Posted by Barb and Steve

"WANDERING WANDA' is BACK!!!!!!

• 
  

Surprise in the dark!!!!....@6 am 8/8/08, east of entrance Friday's TGIF'ers find Nest#13..".WANDERING WANDA" returns again!  "WW" zigzagged all over the beach until she settled upon a spot-directly across from her other nest (Nest #5) where she visited on 7/4 on the west side of the path. Our persistent 'fox' visited first, luckily we arrived early(still dark!) and scared her away, unfortunately she dug up 4 eggs(3 outside and 1 inside) before we arrived!

'Wandering Wanda' decided (both Nests #5, #13) the "PATH" over the Dunes was too big a challenge....we walkers agree!

Nancy Stinger joined us today and was thrilled to be part of the find.  Barb and Steve came right over and protected the nest securely and Nancy M., was with us-she always brings us luck!

• TGIF'ers: Larry/Ardie, Pam/Tom, Kathy H., Nancy S., Joan A.
• Posted by Pam M., Kathy H., and Nancy M.TGIF'ers play the numbers

Inventory of Nest#1 on Waties Island

August 6th, 2008 we met at the shed 7:30 to go out to see what was happening to Nest#1. Karen Fuss,her guests,Stephanie,Nancy,Steve,Sherry,Linda and Karen were all on hand to help. Stephanie and Nancy started out removing the layers of sand trying to find the nest. Karen and Steve were also lending a hand when Stephanie found the first egg then the second and final one of the nest. One egg had a hole in it with several red ants present and the second egg contained a dead premature hatchling. As you may recall this nest was laid back in May and only two eggs had survived the fox's visit.The baby turtles did not survive but not because of any lack of effort on the part of the volunteers. All eye's now will be on Nest#2 between markers 4 and 5 to await the arrival of the baby loggerheads.Posted by Chuck and Karen Fox.

Fox invades two nests on Waties Island

August 5th,2008 was a busy day on Waties Island. As we walked over the dunes to get to the beach we saw fresh fox tracts. We

divided up into our two groups to start our patrol . Sandy, Sherry,Donna and Karen set out to patrol the North end while Bob(Sandy's husband) Nancy,Dave and Judy started the south end. As we walked the North end we saw the fox out on the beach but as soon as he saw us it was off to the safety of the Dunes. The second fox kept walking near the surf coming up to the dunes twice and then returning back to the surf. He finally retreated to the dunes just past the beached dock on the high tide line. I started to think maybe we would find a nest further down the beach but what we found was the remains of what the fox Had done. At nest #10 he dug right under the cage and ate several eggs. I called Nancy to tell her what we found only to hear her tell me that they had found the same thing at nest#12. Barbara and Steve were called to assist us in repairing the nests. Steve and his niece Kim were out on the ATV on turtle patrol so Barbara said as soon as they return they would meet us on the beach. A big Thank you to Steve for collecting all the volunteers from various points on the beach to help get the job done. Nest#9 also had some minor repairs done but they were caused by the weather and not the Fox. One of our regular walkers Rita had her two granddaughters out today so they got to learn how destructive that fox can be. Another job well done by the Tuesday Turtle Trackers.

posted by Chuck & Karen Fox