CCU Family Day on Waties - September 20

On Saturday, September 20, CCU Center for Marine and Wetland Science hosted an open house (should this be "open island"?) for freshmen and their parents in conjunction with other Family Day activities. Over 200 visitors came out to see Waties and learn about some of the research and projects that are conducted on the island. If you click on the photos, you can see the details.



Karen at a table displaying some information about our turtle monitoring program.

Dr. Paul Gayes greeting visitors where he gave them some island history and talked about the types of research that CMWS does out on the property.



Dr. Eric Wright talking about a ground penetrating radar project he is conducting.



Another display of turtle artifacts - model of a sea turtle, plastic cast of a loggerhead skull and some real rib bones. There was a book made up of photos that volunteers have taken during the season for people to look through.


Allie was there representing the summer interns who monitored Myrtle and North Myrtle beaches this summer looking for sea turtle nests. She demonstrated how to dig a new nest for the relocated eggs.

She spent time with both parents and the freshmen explaining the monitoring project. She also demonstrated probing and showed people the fake nest she built (golf balls make great turtle eggs).

A display of sea shells collected on the island. Bob and Sandy Frantom provided a basket of lettered olives (the SC state shell) so visitors could take home a souvenir from their visit.



Not a whole lot of beach left for visitors to walk on - the tide was coming in.



And in it came! We initially set the tent up in the entryway rather than on the beach, but still we had to move everything back once the tide was high.


Bob and Sandy exploring the beach with some visitors.

Photos by Nancy Mercurio; posted by Barb Demusz