The National Weather Service for the Tampa Bay area identifies our rainy season as May 25-Oct. 10.
Meanwhile, the Atlantic hurricane season runs June 1-Nov. 30.
Both seasons coincide with sea turtle nesting season, which is May 1-Oct. 31. During nesting season, female sea turtles come ashore to lay eggs and return to the water. The eggs incubate in the sand for about 55 days, yielding a new generation of hatchlings that crawl to the Gulf of Mexico to begin their journey toward maturity.
People might wonder how sea turtle nests survive during periods of heavy rainfall or even more hazardous weather, like tropical storms or hurricanes.
Sometimes nests are washed over and eggs are lost. In other cases, hatchlings still emerge successfully.
Anna Maria Island Turtle Watch and Shorebird Monitoring, which patrols the beaches daily during nesting season, does not relocate or remove nests due to storm threats. AMITW’s job is to document nesting activity and its concern is the human impact on nature — like renourishment activity — not nature’s impact on nature.
Plus, sea turtles have evolved natural strategies for survival, including laying many eggs to increase the likelihood that some hatchlings will swim on.
Curious about how those swimmers deal with hurricanes?
There’s some research on the question.
In 2011, 18 adult and juvenile loggerhead sea turtles outfitted with satellite trackers were foraging in the direct path of Hurricane Irene in the Atlantic Ocean.
Most of the turtles moved north during the storm, aligning themselves with the surface currents, perhaps to conserve energy.
For turtles that stayed in their pre-storm foraging areas, researchers observed longer dive durations. Some dives lasted an hour or more, compared with less than 30 minutes for a typical dive before the storm.
The turtles that left their foraging areas after the hurricane passed moved south earlier than would be expected based on their normal seasonal movements. This change also was more than a month earlier than the typical seasonal cooling in the water column.
Researchers also observed that the turtles did not return to their pre-storm behavior within two weeks after Irene passed.
Shorebirds status
AMITW is monitoring shorebird activity in Bradenton Beach and reported May 22 that nesting colonies of black skimmers and least terns are expanding, with 36 skimmer nests and 14 tern nests under incubation.
Crow effigies were installed around the colonies to discourage fish crows from preying on eggs.
The colonies also are staked and marked off to keep people from disturbing the birds.
Turtle talks
AMITW’s Turtle Tracks & Shorebird Facts is a free weekly presentation at 10 a.m. Mondays through August at Holmes Beach City Hall, 5801 Marina Drive.
For more information, visit islandturtlewatch.com or call 941-301-8434.
By the numbers
As of May 22, AMITW reported 30 nests and 42 false crawls.