Excavation day!!

Miles walked: 106

Today was the very first nest excavation of the turtle season, this morning we were on the beach at 5 am to dig up two recently hatched Leatherback nests. The biological station excavates all nests two days after the first signs of hatchling emergence have been detected (i.e. teeny turtle tracks in the sand). This is so that we can determine the factors affecting hatchling success, and  to see if there are any live turtles still in the nest.

It was all fun and games at first - everyone was excited at the chance to see a hatchling.We dug, by hand, about 60cm into the first nest when it became very apparent that something smelled a little funky. We kept digging until reached a layer of hatched eggshells from turtles that had already left the nest, along with some undeveloped eggs covered with maggots. I'm so grateful for the face masks my Mom gave me before I left, I probably would have lost my cookies in the egg chamber if it weren't for my mask.The smell was so strong and has permeated everything that was on the beach with us- even after a shower and a change of clothes I can't get rid of the smell of rotting Leatherback eggs. Needless to say, I'm turned off of scrambled huevos for a while.

Since this particular nest had been dug up by stray dogs, we thought the chances of finding a live hatchling were slim. As we removed and counted the egg shells, we came upon a tiny head sticking out of the sand so we carefully removed the hatchling from the nest to check if he was alive. We all breathed a sigh of relief when he began to squirm around.

Too happy to notice my shirt is falling down

After letting the little hatchling go to the sea, we started again with the dirty work. There was only one live hatchling in the nest, and about 4 dead ones. There were also undeveloped rotting eggs that needed to be opened to determine what prevented their success (mostly predation from crabs, fungi and maggots). This was my least favourite part but the live hatchling made it all worth it! We'll be preforming excavations regularly now since most of our nests are nearing the end of their two month incubation period. Maggots and all, I'm still having the time of my life here in Tortuguero.

Excavating a nest tends to look a lot like I'm robbing a bank