Rather than a new topic each day, here are the happenings combined into this one “Winding Down” topic.
Sunday, September 8 – Nothing to report
Monday, September 9 – Nothing to report
Tuesday, September 10 – Nothing to report
Wednesday, September 11 – No activity on Caswell Beach, but OKI had 2 hatchlings emerge yesterday from a nest that was lightly overwashed.
Thursday, September 12 – Nothing to report
Friday, September 13 – We are checking everyday but still nothing. The ATV has been turned in so we are on foot now. We have set a date for our end of year celebration for October 3rd, 5-7 p.m.
Saturday, September 14 – Nothing to report
Saturday, September 21 – Still nothing from our nest but Ocean Isle posted on Facebook that one of their nests that was under water during the king tides and Dorian hatched with 72% hatching. There is still hope. We are counting days and will not do any excavations until at least 70 days.
Tuesday, September 24 – Today is day 70 for nest 89 and was inventoried this morning.
- There were 92 shells, 1 pipped, 4 unhatched and 66 dead hatchlings. Apparently some hatchlings emerged between the king tides and Dorian.
- Oak Island did have a boil with 58 hatchlings emerging yesterday. It was a nest that was covered with water from the king tides. You just never know.
- We still have 5 nests.
Saturday, September 28 – Inventory results from nests excavated at 70 days:
- Nest 92: 114 unhatched eggs and 8 shells. The unhatched eggs felt like they had hatchlings so we open one to see if it was still alive. It was not but was probably 4-5 weeks developed. The empty shells looked like hatched eggs
- Nest 93: 50 unhatched eggs, 1 pipped and 69 shells. There was a mass of dead hatchlings but too decomposed to attempt counting. There were a few dead hatchlings in the sidewalls that were on there way to emerging. No way to know if any made it out.
Sunday, September 29 – Nest 95 inventory results: 121 unhatched eggs. We opened an egg to check progress and embryos were about 5-6 weeks.
Don’t know if you’ve been to the beach lately but there’s piles of grass straw with trash all in it so be careful if you walk in it. There’s wood of all sorts on the beach. There was a beach sign from the Bahamas amongst some of the debris so no doubt where that one came from. Anyway, if you come for a walk please bring a bag or 2 to pick up some of the little stuff. Caswell Beach is considering hiring someone with equipment to clean up too. We may want to do an organized walk later.
Tuesday, October 1 –
- Nest 96 inventory results: 119 unhatched eggs. There were a bunch of unfertilized (pink squished) eggs and then a good number that had embryos that were distinguishable but not very far along.
- Nest 97 had fox, coyote or other canine dig into it during the night and then before I got out there the tide had covered it, washed away the green and left a pool of water. We went ahead and excavated 111 unhatched eggs and have no way of knowing if the animal took any. The embryos were young.
- That was the last nest….all the adversities all in the same day. It was a great year in spite!
- Thank you again for a wonderful season.