Turtle Stats for 2012

The sea turtle nesting and hatchling season has come to an end. We haven't had a nest since early August. Our 44th and final clutch of the year hatched about one week ago. The monsoon season, and its accompanying waves (which are a blast to surf in a sit-on-top kayak), is creeping in. So no more Green or Hawksbill turtles will lay eggs and obviously no new young-ins will hatch. As Mr. Womack sang, "it's all over now." Take a glance below at our numbers for 2012. Not atrocious, but not too robust either.

Only 8 female turtles visited 3 beaches. Not to confuse anyone but that's very low. There used to be 2-3 different turtles visiting Mentawak beach (where JTP resides) per night decades ago. This year just 3 showed up - out of 8 months when they coulda nested. The optimistic takeaway is that projects doing hatchery work, protecting eggs and releasing babies have seen an increase in nesting turtles, but we got a long way to go before that's possible for us. Green turtles take 25-40 years before they return to nest (longer than any turtle, marine or terrestrial, in the world). Hawksbills start plopping out eggs a little earlier, after 20 years. JTP has only been around for 6 years, with a government run hatchery operating for 5 years before that. We got some time before it's possible for more turtles to start showing up. Another bright spot: I'm proud of our 88.4% hatching success rate. At least we got as many of those tiny turtles into the ocean as we could.

Funny Field Work Follies (and the letter F goes wild!)

Field work, just like life, can be spectacular, routine, drab, infuriating or just plain silly. Sometimes when you're on point and luck is rolling the dice with you, I've seen things that have gave me goosebumps. Witnessed events that have caused me to yell out joyful curse words and pump my fist, Arsenio Hall style. A few weeks before we departed I was lucky enough, after following her for 1.5 hours, to watch a Gila monster we were radio tracking dig out a juvenile Cottontail rabbit nest and scarf down some furry youngsters. Incredible. I was on cloud nine for the entire ordeal. That's about as amazing a day you can have in the field.

The female Gila on her way to finding a Cottontail rabbit nest. This is one healthy lizard.

But then there's days where all you do is sweat and are exhausted, you forget to take a specific data point, leave all the vital gear you need at home or totally just blow it. The key to it all: laughing at yourself when you mess up. A lot. And then making sure you don't do the same idiotic thing twice. I once dropped my keys out of my backpack while tracking a Gila monster at night by myself. Over 3 hours later I found them. Never again have I pulled that move.

Charlie (face bomb!) cruising the boat to Munjur beach at the sun sets on Tioman. Juara Bay is in the background.

That being said, Charlie and I recently spent two nights in a row camping (err, maybe being on a stakeout is a more appropriate term) on Munjur beach in anticipation of a re-nesting Green sea turtle. Hmmmm, I just didn't do any foreshadowing about how this endeavor worked out. Munjur is one of two uninhabited beaches we monitor that are directly south of Juara Bay here. It's probably about a 15 minute boat ride. So let's see: camping near the beach in hope of finding a nesting Green turtle so we can measure the mama and tag her plus get a nest for our hatchery, yup I can get to that. Cue Ziggy Stardust lyrics though: it ain't (that) easy!

Will Smith bearing down on Munjur Beach, one of the 3 sea turtle nesting beaches we monitor daily.

The first night started off with a solid sign: two turtles were mating near the beach as we rode in. For the record: JTP's boat is named Will Smith. I would have gone with Jeff Goldblum, but that's another story. We then walked in with our gear and started looking for a place to camp. We chose some ground on the north end of the beach between the high tide line and end of the jungle. More sweet news: an Oriental Whip Snake (Ahaetulla prasina, AHPR) greeted us in the leaves. It's a graceful snake that moves through trees and other vegetation while looking for lizards and frogs to munch on. First time I've seen this one. Only bummer news is I forgot my camera. So all the photos on this blog are from the second night.

A gorgeous underneath view of the Oriental Whipsnake (Ahaetulla  prasina, AHPR).  These guys can be a variety of colors, but this one was like Laffy Taffy green.

Overhead view. Sweet view of its wrapped around the branch and leaves.

Well, hammocks got set up, a small, hidden fire burned, and then Mega-moon came out around 22:30 hours. Talk about bright! The beach was lit up for real, for real. To miss a turtle on this beach would be tough, but alas, we did. As high tide rolled in we got sleepy. Charlie dozed off and I fell asleep for about 10 minutes. After waking up I had a weird feeling of panic that maybe we missed her. So I scampered down the rocks and started walking the sand. The strech in front of us was track free but as I walked up to the southern end of the beach, which of course turtles don't visit too often and you can't see from our makeshift campsite, two sets of turtle tracks were there! One for the way in, the other on the way out. No turtle. No nest. She came up, just like the day before, moseyed around and then headed back to the ocean. I woke up Charlie, we checked out the scene some more, hung our heads in despair as sand flies bit us on the beach, and then decided it's a wrap. We swam out to the boat and got back to JTP around 2am.

North end of Munjur at sunset.

Not to be defeated, we were very sure that after coming ashore two nights in a row this mother turtle was ready to drop a clutch on the third night. Back to the camping spot. More jolly times at Munjur! This time I remembered my camera (and binos!), but forgot shoes. Walking on wet coral and rock is not a skill I have mastered yet out here. It took awhile for me to even walk in with our gear. Looking at the photo of low tide you can understand why. Back to the same spot. I had a warm and fuzzy feeling the turtle was gonna show. I searched for more snakes after the sun went down, finding another AHPR in the trees. Then we scarfed some take-out noodles, shot the shit and waited on the tide. The moon came out. No turtle seen. I had a feeling again I needed to get down to the beach. With no red light on (we were being extra careful to not spook the turtle) I made my way and in the first minute I saw tracks on the stretch of beach in front of us. One set. Then noise. Tossed sand and the movement of a flipper. She must be starting to dig her nest! It's always feels glorious when you find what you set out for.

Low tide, slippery rocks, sharp coral and an uncoordinated Brian make for slug-like walking. But I got no open gashes on my legs so that was a plus.

I woke Charlie up and we crept back. She was still flinging sand so after checking out the rest of Munjur we took a seat away from her on the beach. She continued to fling sand. Time passed. Chit-chat here and there. Silence for a little while and then I heard a noise behind us. Holy Toledo that's a turtle heading back to sea. She ran into our cooler we use for the eggs and almost head butted Charlie's backbone. She was on the move and we misjudged her big time! Her nest was layed and she was covering it up when I first saw her. Maybe we should have at least shined some light on her once. We thought about tagging her on the way back, but decided not to. She was ready to get back in the water and make us feel like morons. I couldn't help but laugh. Two nights of camping and no nest collected, no measurements made and no tags placed on her flippers. We laughed a ton and she swam away. I hope she was chuckling too.

Our improvised (and in the end failed) stakeout location. That piece of driftwood  we found made for a lovely bench though. 

Since midnight was on deck and the tide was high we decided to call it, bail on camping and boat back to the JTP. Swimming out to the boat, trying not to slice my foot open in the dark water, I couldn't stop smiling. I knew we'd get the nest in the morning so no worries about that (yeah, Izati brought the eggs back, 98 total). I had to admire how well we succeeded in failing. I think we'll do a few things differently next time. As Will Smith motored back under the night sky I didn't feel too much like he did at the end of Independence Day. Heck, I wasn't even feeling much like Will Smith at all, since he's usually doing everything right and saving the world from imminent demise (ID4, iRobot, Bad Boys, MIB, the list goes on and on). But at least we gave everyone else here something to joke about for awhile.

A Turtle at our Doorstep

In the early morning on 27 April, Joris (a volunteer from Holland) spoke through our open room window and asked if we wanted to see a turtle. Well, it was about 2am so at first I had no idea what was happening. After I got my bearings and stopped dreaming about the new Neil Young and Crazy Horse album (just guessing on that one), I realized hell yeah I wanna see a turtle. I tried to get Alli up, but the lady was too sleepy this time around.

Back to the sea, trudging along!

The lucky part: this very wide Green turtle mama decided to nest right at the beach in front of the JTP. Boom-shack-alacka! Like NBA Jam used to say. By the time she had been spotted she already had her eggs covered up and was going nutty with her front flippers. Sand was moving. She was only a couple meters from our hatchery so there was no point in digging up the nest and moving it there. We left it in-situ. We missed our window to tag her front flippers so hopefully on the return visit we can get that done.

Dani and I measuring the outside width of her tracks after she left the beach. I a like this photo!

She should return in the next 4-5 days. It'll be her second time coming back to Mentawak Beach so we don't know for sure what her re-nesting interval is gonna be yet . The portly turtle gave us our 8th nest of the year. The ocho.

The in-situ nest right in front of the JTP.

On her saunter back to the ocean is when we measured her shell, took some photos and then bid her adieu. She took 15 minutes to get back to the water - entering just a smidge before 3am. She probably first came ashore right around midnight. Her tracks were measured and shortly later I was back in bed. Whether Neil Young crept back into my dreamscape I can't recall. He definitely wasn't in Alli's. She hates that dude (an unfortunate trait I think she inherited from her Mom).

Her nest in relation to where our hatchery is.

And her tracks the next day before her mesh enclosure went up.

The Female Green Turtle Returns!!!

Once sea turtles start laying eggs you can start to narrow down the date when they will return again. Creatures of habit these swimming reptiles are. Lucky us. Knowing the date is coming up round here gets our blood boiling. A large female Green turtle dropped 121 eggs within the first half hour of 14 April. She chose Mentawak beach, where JTP is located, so there's a strong shot she was born here 25-30 years ago since the mommas return to where they were born. This species' renesting interval is 10 - 14 days so starting two nights ago our eyes were wide when we strolled the beach at night.

Alli getting in there! It was her first time collecting as a turtle laid eggs. Exciting!

She didn't come back after 10 days, but on the 11th, she came through! Charlie got the call as we were hopping on the motorbikes after a superb dinner (my belly was bursting with potato curry and peanut chicken) in Juara. Onward we went! By the time Alli and I arrived with the processing gear she was flicking sand out with her front flippers and bout to deliver some eggs. Excellent timing!

The whole shebang! 104 total.

Everything played out quite nice-ty (as Bootsy sings). We had a full house in attendance. Besides Alli and I, Charlie, Izati (also full-time at JTP), Ina, Dani (German hatchery intern), another German (his name slips my mind), and Michelle (our new volunteer from Holland) were all there gazing at a huge shell tinged in red light. After she dug the egg hole with her rear flippers (the process looks remarkably like a construction scooper), the eggs started plopping down on the sand. And this time Alli got in there, shoulder deep, and scooped some eggs out (Arizona represent!). She loved it. Having a sticky sea turtle egg fall on the top of your hand is quite the feeling.

The female Green turtle after she did her work. She was breathing heavy after it all!

All in all this time only 104 eggs total, 17 less than last time. We need to figure out why the number dropped. The eggs are under the sand in our hatchery now. In about 2 months the babies will scurry up. And in 11 days we can expect the momma to return to plop out some more. The nesting season is hopefully ramping up! The more the merrier round here.

Her tracks back to the sea around 630 hours this morning. Still there and looking solid in the morning light.