last night both Chris and I had the feeling that the leatherbacks would start nesting earlier in the night. they had been coming up around 2 or 3 the previous few nights. we started out as the tide was receding, but the surf was much higher than the night before. i passed lots of people on my way north and they all asked "where are the turtles," since none of us had seen a single crawl. i knew that all we had to do was wait...and it was not long before the loggerheads began emerging en masse. Chris called to report "hundreds" of loggerheads on his end of the beach.
on my second run i spotted a leatherback in the distance with a few young guys a little too close to her. she ended up false crawling, not sure if she liked the immediate company as she made her way out of the water (she was not tagged). i continued along, making my way south. once i headed back up north, and made it to Carlin Park i saw a leatherback just coming out of the water. she was still in the surf and i knew it was a leathery turtle by the way her carapace was distinctively pointy at the rear end. you can really see this feature through the night scope on a bright night. i watched her for a bit and it appeared that she was quite indecisive. she crawled up, then down, then up, then made a nice figure 8, and bailed. it was the same turtle as before.
disappointed, i continued north only to find another leatherback body pitting up near the Ocean Trails condo. she was just beginning to dig, AND she was not tagged either, so i had plenty of time to get my gear ready and collect all the information i needed from her and give her some tags. i decided to name her Patricia after my mom, who is leaving Juno for the summer with my stepdad Gordon (have fun guys!). just as i finished up my work with this new turtle i headed south only to see ANOTHER leatherback crawling up the beach only a few hundred meters from the other one. i watched from a distance as she crawled up, then down, then up, then down...i was sensing a pattern...as this turtle made her final walk back to the water i checked her for tags (none), so i assume this was the turtle that crawled twice before. i wonder what she found so displeasing!
chris had no leatherbacks to report but did see some wildlife on Singer Island...! we are looking for Musca at the moment, hoping to see her one more time before she leaves Florida waters for the season. she's got a satellite/gps tag that we would like to remove before she goes. stay tuned for updates on that.
