Loggerhead Turtle Eggs

I have lived here for 8 years now and have never witnessed a mother turtle laying her eggs, the eggs hatching, or the baby turtles crawling out to sea.  What I did witness this evening just before sunset is loggerhead turtle eggs being dug up and very gingerly placed into coolers along with some of the wet sand from the nest.  The reason for the removal of the eggs is due to the BP oil spill.  According to one of the biologists conducting the egg removal, relocating the eggs to the East coast will hopefully ensure that the hatchlings have a better chance of survival.  It is their belief that if they hatched here and continued on their natural course, they would starve because the areas where they feed along their journey in the Gulf have been affected by the oil.  Many older turtles have already been stranded and found covered with oil.  I forget the names of the folks in charge, and while all four of them were very nice, one in particular (the girl in the white T-shirt and Cubs baseball cap) was very informative and very enthusiastic to share information about Loggerhead turtles as well as other sea turtles.  She very patiently explained what they were doing and why and also explained how to distinguish the species of the turtle by the crawl tracks they leave behind.  It was actually very interesting.  When placing the eggs into the coolers, they made every effort to place the eggs just as they were oriented in the nest. It was explained that the membrane in the egg is very fragile and any change in position could damage it. I forget the number of eggs in this nest, but I believe it was around 100.  These turtle eggs and others that they will harvest and have already harvested on the Gulf Coast will be taken to the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral to incubate and when they hatch will then be taken to different areas on the East coast and released into the Atlantic.  I was told the eggs from this nest should hatch in 7-10 days.  Here are some photos.

 

Nest are typically about 18-22 inches deep and have between 100-125 eggs

My neighbor/friend Janice and her dog Lucy also stopped by to observe.

Happy Birthday America!

I never seem to get these posted on the actual day of the event. This one is for 4th of July weekend.  It started off with Sy spending Friday night with us.  Since I am getting old and can barely remember yesterday, I am not sure what we did that night.  I do know that the next day, Christie, Joey, Thomas and Gracie came down and we mostly hung out in and under the house.  Christie and Joey went to the Blue Parrot to eat lunch and the tots stayed with us.  Later, Ryan and Ashley came with oysters, so we had oysters, hamburgers and hot dogs (some burned to a crisp like me and Christie like'um) on the grill.  Of course there was watermelon too.  Yummy! Terry, Vicky, Aidan and Aubrey came by too and all the kids made beautiful art on the concrete with sidewalk chalk.  Thomas and Gracie were infatuated with taking ice out of the oyster cooler and putting it in a bucket of water.  On Sunday, we got up and had a big breakfast (Thomas helped mix the pancakes) and then we rushed to get the boat ready for the parade.  The weather was looking a little questionable, but we decided to go on with it.  Everything was going quite well until we started getting blasted by water guns and water hoses.  It's all part of the parade, but Miss Gracie was not particularly fond of getting blasted.  Joey, Christie, Thomas and Gracie got off at the Lighthouse so that left Ryan, Ashley, Sy and Me on the boat.  We did eventually get out of the parade ourselves because it was beginning to literally "rain on our parade".  We all gathered back at the house and dried off.  I attempted to get a picture of my three precious little grandbabies in their 4th of July outfits, but let's just say they were less than cooperative. 

 

I WAS BORN READY

This weekend Ryan, Ashley and Sy came back to pick up another load to take back to Havana.  They stopped by on Saturday and we went to El Jalisco for lunch.  Sy is beginning to talk so much and will repeat anything you say.  They have taught him to say "I was born ready" when you asked if if he is ready to go or ready for whatever.  I made a short video of it because it is so dad gum cute! 

Sunday night Gary and I and Steve and Linda had dinner at Fran & Ann's house.  We had grilled chicken, cole slaw, margaritas, sweet potatoes, tomatoes and cucumbers and chocolate  cherry truffles.  Yum Yum!  We shared a lot of stories and had a great time.  The sunset was spectacular too!