County Turtle Watch Looking
For Another Big Year
BY DOUG RUTTKR
It's that time of year again. The
next live or six months will he
busy ones lor volunteers with
the Brunswick County Turtle
Watch program.
They'll be waking up early and
staying up late, doing whatever
thev can to help baby sea turtles be
gin their tumultuous lives on the
right loot -or in this case, the right
Hipper.
Sponsored by Brunswick County
Parks and Recreation, the turtle
watch uses volunteers to monitor
sea turtle nestings, relocate nests
threatened by tidal waters and help
babies get to the ocean.
Tina Pritchard. county coordina
tor. said the county department
started running the program three
years ago. It's getting better each
year, she says, because the same,
experienced volunteers keep com
ing back.
Coordinators at the South Bruns
wick Islands beaches include Min
nie Hunt at Sunset Beach. Gloria
Hillenburg at Ocean Isle and Judy
Bryan and Sid Swarts at Holden
Beach.
The turtle nesting season in
Brunswick County usually begins
in mid-May and runs through late
August. Nests typically start hatch
ing in late July and continue into
October.
Sea turtles laid about 4(X) nests
along the Brunswick County coast
last year, said Ms. Pritchard. From
those nests, an estimated 1 1 .5(X)
young, each the size of a silver dol
lar, made it safely to the water.
Ms. Pritchard is afraid to predict
what kind of year 1W2 will be for
sea turtle nesting. She ealled for a
slow year in I Wl . and Long Beach
ended up having its biggest year
ever.
"This year I told them that 1 re
fused to comment." she joked. "I
hope it's a big year. We're expect
II 't V 'I uv ?
For the first time this year. Ms.
Pritchard said volun
teers involved in relocating the tur
tle nests are wearing red shirts and
blue hats so they can be easily
identified.
Nests have to be moved
if the are in danger of
being washed away
by a high tide. It's a'
very tedious process, be-'
cause the fragile
eggs can't be
twisted and must]
be placed in the
new nest exactly
they were found.
Area residents and visitors will
once again be able to "adopt" turtle
nests this year. People who "adopt"
wail at the nest as the hatching date
approaches, count the babies when
they emerge from the nest and lead
them to the ocean with flashlights.
Turtle watch coordinators don't
anticipate any problem finding
"parents" this year like they did a
few years ago. "People are already
calling and the season hasn't even
started yet." Ms. Pritchard said ear
lier this month.
The "adopt-a-nest" program is a
real hit with the tourists, many of
whom arc extremely curious about
the sea turtle nesting and hatching
activity.
Mrs. Bryan, one of the program
coordinators at Holdcn Beach, said
she received 437 letters over the
winter from folks who want to
adopt nests during their visit to the
beach this summer.
"There's a lot ol interest,
and I'm so thankful because
they're realizing the plight of
the turtle now," she said.
Ms. Pritchard said the
county gets telephone
calls from people all over
the country who want to plan their
vacation around the sea turtles.
"They want to know when to
come down so they can see a nest
hatch," she said. T^irtle watch vol
unteers can't say for sure when a
particular nest will hatch, so adopt
ing nests requires patience.
After an off-year at Holden
Beach in 1991, Mrs. Bryan expects
a "bumper crop" of turtle nests this
year. Sea turtles laid 43 nests on the
beach last year, down from 65 nests
in 1W0.
"Last year was characterized as a
poor year." Mrs. Bryan said. "1
don't think it was so poor bccause
wc worked so hard."
A core of 13 volunteers makes
up the community's turtle patrol.
They take turns riding the strand
each morning in an all-terrain vchi
cic to iook it n iiesLs laid the night
before.
They also move nests. Mrs. Bry
an said there could he a lot of
nests to relocate this year be
cause there isn't much beach
above the high tide line except
ai the west end of the
island.
Several local
| beach towns have
asked the state legis
lature to designate them as tur
tle sanctuaries.
Ms. Pritchard
said the designation
'would help educate and make
jpeople aware of sea turtle ac
tivity along the coast. Also,
signs could be posted at beach
accessways letting people know
about penalties for
harassing turtles.
Because sea turtles are an endan
gered and threatened species, peo
ple who harass the reptiles or de
stroy their nests can be fined up to
$10,000 and sentenced to 10 years
in jail.
Bald Head Island has its own tur
tle watch program conducted by the
BHI Conservancy, a non-profit or
ganization dedicated to protecting
the island's natural resources.
Visitors can become conservancy
members and "adopt" a nest as they
ean at other area beaches.
Four different kinds of sea turtles
arc known to nest in Brunswick
County, but the most common is
the loggerhead. Others are the
Green Sea turtle, the leathcrbaek
and the Kemp's Ridley, which is
extremely rare.
Sea turtles almost always nest at
night, dragging themselves across
the sand to a spot above the high
tide line where they dig a hole with
their hind flippers, lay between SO
and 2(X) eggs and cover them with
sand.
Alter an incubation period of 50
to 85 days, baby turtles come out of
their nest. Halehlings usually come
out at night and are drawn to the
ocean by reflective light from the
moon.
Scientists estimate that only one
in 1 .(XX) babies survives to adult
hood. Many eggs arc wiped out by
crabs and ocean tides before they
hateh. and babies are often eaten by
sharks, birds and other predators as
they make their way to the Gulf
Stream where they mature.
It is believed that female sea tur
tles always return to the beach
where they were born to lay their
eggs. Once they are mature, turtles
nest every two or three years and
can live to be 100 years old.
Despite the high mortality rate
and nesting problems associated
with beachfront development, sci
entists believe sea turtles have ex
isted for 200 million years. They go.
back to the days of the dinosaurs.
Saby Sea Turtles Guided By Natural Compass
BY DAVID WILLIAMSON
UNC-CH News Ser\>ices
Did you ever wonder how ba
by sea turtles can scurry
down to the ocean after
hatching, paddle thousands of miles
across the North Atlantic and find
their way back years later to the
beach where they were bom *
A University of North Carolina
at Chapel Hill biologist curious
about the creatures has discovered
at least part of the answer. Baby
loggerhead turtles, no bigger than a
child's hand, use the earth's mag
netic field and waves to orient
themselves and direct their
marathon swims.
Writing in the January issue of
Scientific American, Kenneth J.
Lohmann, Ph.D., assistant profes
sor of biology, describes experi
ments showing the turtles' sophisti
cated biological compasses.
"The extraordinary navigational
abilities of sea turtles have no doubt
contributed to their evolutionary
success, enabling them to exploit
feeding grounds far removed from
nesting sites," Lohmann says.
"They arc an ancient group of ani
mals. relative!) unchanged in the
fossil record lor millions of years."
Working with Michael Sain* hi
and Jcancttc Wyneken of Florida
Atlantic rnivcrsit>. the biologist
tethered loggerhead hatchlings to a
lever-arm device and placed them
in a fiberglass satellite dish filled
with water. The tether enabled the
researchers to record which direc
tion the reptiles swam in the dark.
"We knew right from the very
beginning that many orientation
cues might be available to the
hatchlings," Lohmann said. "Other
migratory animals, for example, re
ly on cues such as the position of
the sun or stars, polarized light,
odors, low frequency sound ? such
as that from waves breaking on a
beach ? and the earth's magnetic
field."
But unlike most other cues, the
earth's geomagnetic field is con
stant night and day and remains
largely unaffected by weather.
After the researchers turned out
the lights and plunged the hatch
lings into total darkness in the labo
ratory, the turtles circled the satel
lite dish as if confused.
But within minutes, they estab
lished consistent courses toward a
specific direction. loiter they alter
nated between circling and swim
ming in the same direction they had
chosen earlier.
"When we calculated the average
direction that the different hatch
lings swam toward, it became clear
that the turtles were not swimming
randomly." Lohmann said. "In
stead. most hatchlings swam to
w arci points between magnetic
north ami cast, adopting bearings
? >
B6ACON FILE PHOTO
SCIENTISTS RELIEVE baby
sea turtles use the earth 's mag
netic field to guide them on
their long journey at sea.
that would lead them away from
the east coast of Florida and toward
the Gulf Stream."
To verify the magnetic effect, the
researchers constructed a tubular
device known as a Rubens cube
coil that circled the big dish of wa
ter and could change the magnetic
field around the animals.
"When activated, the coil gener
ated a weak, relatively uniform
magnetic field throughout the area
it enclosed." Lohmann said. "The
coil was adjusted to generate a field
twice as strong as the horizontal
component of the earth's field but
opposite in direction. Thus we
could reverse at will the magnetic
field experienced by the turtles."
The biologists found that when
they reversed the magnetic field,
the batchlings swam in the opposite
direction ? toward the southwest.
Repeating the experiment in a float
ing cage offshore, they found that
the animals swam vigorously to
ward the open sea even when out of
sight of land.
A further discovery at sea was
that the baby turtles often swim into
waves because waves usually come
from the open ocean. Lohmann and
his colleagues confirmed that short
ly after Hurricane Hugo when a
strong west wind created unusual
waves that moved eastward away
from the Florida coast. On that day,
untethered turtles swam into the
waves, back toward land.
How adult turtles are able to use
the earth's magnetic field and other
cues is not yet understood, he says.
Adults may be able to determine
their position through differences in
the field at different latitudes. They
might also recognize their birth
places by the chemical composition
of the water.
The sun could help guide adult
loggerheads, but since other re
searchers have found them to be
extremely nearsighted, it is unlikely
they navigate by stars.
"Understanding how adult turtles
navigate may one day enable re
turning females to be tricked into
nesting on protected beaches,"
Lohmann says. "Studying the ori
entation mechanisms of sea turUes
not only provides insight into one
of the most sophisticated naviga
tion systems ever to evolve, it may
also help save these animals from
extinction."
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