Isle of Palms/Sullivans Island

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Nest #41 Inventoried on IOP

   

   

Nest #41 at Beach Club Villas had hatchings come out Sunday night. It contained 93 eggs that were laid low on the beach at that location on August 2. Today we found 71 empty eggshells, 45 dead hatchlings and 7 live hatchlings still in the nest. Sue White released these to crawl to the water. The Firestone and Naylor children were happy to see the seven healthy ones crawl into the wind whipped ocean prior to the arrival of Hurricane Ian. It was a chilly and windy morning, and the water was warmer than the air, making it a better temperature for the little turtles. Hatch success was 76.3%, but only 20.4% made it out of the nest. We do not know why so many died in the nest after hatching.

 

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Nest #38 Inventoried on IOP

   

   

When we inventoried Nest #38 on the Isle of Palms this morning, we found 61 empty eggshells and 63 undeveloped eggs. Avery Firestone got permission to be late to her class at Sullivan's Island Elementary School in order to be at the inventory of this nest that she and her mother found on July 23rd at 56th Avenue near the hotel in Wild Dunes. There were no hatchlings left in the nest dead or alive. Hatch success was 48.8%. Because ghost crabs had preyed upon the hatchlings as they came out of this nest three nights ago, we put nine PVC pipe ghost crab traps around the two remaining nests that are at that location and still unhatched. We will remove traps when the time comes for those two final nests to hatch and hope to catch some of the crabs before that time. 

 

 

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