Turtle report: Fancy stakes for turtle adoption
BY ARLENE HALL
BGSTA SECRETARY
A stroll down the beaches from around 19th Street south to the parking lot by the state park will reveal some brightly colored stakes being used to protect incubating sea turtle nests. They range from multicolored polka dots, stripes, and flower designs to royal blue and white stakes with turtle plaques attached. What’s with all these fancy stakes? These are the results of two different BGSTA programs, a project with art classes from The Island School and the Adopt-a-Nest program.
Last November, BGSTA volunteers provided a demonstration of Turtle Patrol activities to The Island School art class students and their teachers. After learning how volunteers identify turtle crawls, stake off the nests to protect them, and then excavate and inventory the nests, the students were asked to help brighten up those plain old yellow stakes by using their creative art skills. A number of the standard yellow stakes were provided to the students who were asked to add their own designs. The response from the children was overwhelmingly enthusiastic and unique. These brightly decorated stakes have been placed on various nests along the public access beaches of the island. Some may still have the artist’s name attached. Be sure to take a moment to admire the hard work and imaginations of these children.
As noted in a previous article, the BGSTA’s Adopt-a-Nest fundraising program opened on June 1st . The royal blue and white stakes indicate adopted nests, with photos and updates of that nest sent to the adoptive “parent” periodically. The attached turtle-shaped plaque reflects the name of the individuals, family, organization or business as designated by the adoptive parent. In just the first week of this year’s program, nearly one-third of the available nests had already been adopted! In fact, one local organization, the Women Warriors of Port Charlotte, quickly pooled enough donations from its members to adopt an incredible 10 nests! All adopted nests are merely symbolic adoptions, but the financial support these adoptions provide for the BGSTA is very real and enables them to continue working on behalf of the island’s nesting sea turtles. For information on adopting a nest before the availability runs out, see the BGSTA website at www.bocagrandeseaturtles.org.
All activities are conducted and authorized under FWC Marine Turtle Permit #MTP-24-123.
Eagerly awaiting green turtles
Loggerhead turtle nesting activity seems to be about one week behind where it was last year, with 265 current nests (compared to 256 as of 6-2-23). There are quite a few more false crawls so far this season when compared to last (451 vs 389) but there could be a number of reasons for this, including beach changes post-Idalia, normal fluctuations in crawl activity, or other factors. Regardless, this season’s loggerhead activity appears to be as expected.
By this time last year, there were already eight (8) green turtle nests and a similar number of green false crawls. BGSTA volunteer turtle patrollers are still eagerly awaiting this year’s first green turtles. On a bright note, mammalian predators have not yet impacted any of the turtle nests; by this week last year, 19 nests had been depredated. The BGSTA has already taken a number of measures to discourage depredations and will continue to work with other entities such as the USDA to help mitigate any depredations that may occur.
At Florida State Parks:
At Florida State Parks:
Gasparilla: 18 loggerhead
Cayo Costa: 227 loggerhead
Don Pedro: 115 loggerhead,
3 green turtle
Stump Pass: 162 loggerhead
