A nighttime stroll on an Anna Maria Island beach in early summer may lead to the once-in-a-lifetime experience of seeing a nesting sea turtle — if you’re lucky.
But in this era of Twitter feeds and Facebook posts, some people might forget that certain memories are best preserved in the mind.
“If you’re on the beach at night and see a sea turtle nesting, don’t take pictures, just stand 100 feet back and let her do her thing. Just enjoy it,” Anna Maria Island Turtle Watch volunteer Denise Gardner said June 13 to people attending “Turtle Talks,” AMITW’s weekly informational session at CrossPointe Fellowship in Holmes Beach.
As of June 13, AMITW reported 180 nests this season, which runs May-October.
Female sea turtles nest onshore mostly at night, when the beaches are dark and predators are minimal. They only leave the water to nest, so the beach is unfamiliar terrain. Any disturbance can lead to a false crawl — a failed nesting attempt.
“If you’re out on the beach at night, let your eyes acclimate instead of turning on a flashlight,” AMITW executive director Suzi Fox said. “Any light could scare a nesting sea turtle and this could scare her back into the sea before she’s done, causing her to drop her eggs in the ocean.”
AMITW volunteers walk the beach each morning at sunrise looking for nests, which when found are staked off for monitoring and protection.
Fox said she recently has had problems with people disturbing nesting sites at night. In some cases, they were trying to help by surrounding the nests with a circle of seagrass and writing messages in the sand that read, “sea turtle nest.”
However, AMITW volunteers walk the island every morning to collect data from the tracks the sea turtle leave behind, not the turtles themselves. Disrupting the sand surrounding a nest can result in difficulty.
Upon finding a crawl, AMITW often will verify a nest — look for the clutch of eggs in relation to the tracks — so volunteers know it is marked off correctly.
If the tracks have been trampled or brushed away by morning, volunteers may not be able to determine where the eggs are or if there are any eggs.
On June 13, volunteers walkingin Bradenton Beach found a nest that had been dug up by people, not predators.
“Disturbing a nest is a federal, state and local offense,” Fox said.
She said if someone spots a nest or a nesting sea turtle at night, they do not need to call turtle watch — a volunteer will see the nest in the morning and mark it with stakes and ribbon.
People should observe without a phone or camera flash.
AMITW section 6 coordinator Anne Camp said, “You can tell people, ‘No, I didn’t take a picture because I was respecting the mama turtle.’”
For more information on the sea turtle habitat, or to report a sick, injured or dead sea turtle, contact Fox at suzilfox@gmail.com or 941-778-5638.
BOX TURTLE STATS …
AMITW sea turtle stats as of June 18: 214 nests and 228 false crawls.