Hundreds of sea turtle hatchlings steal the show in Florida during America’s birthday – via Herp Digest

by Michelle Marchante, Miami Herald

JULY 05, 2019

Go to https://www.miamiherald.com/news/state/florida/article232321862.html 

to see video.

Hundreds of baby sea turtles were spotted making their way to the ocean during the prime hours of America’s birthday in Fernandina Beach in North Florida and it was all caught on camera.

Becky Finsness, who recorded the video, has lived in the area for 30 years and has never had a Fourth of July quite like this one.

“It was awesome to watch these little guys make their way to the ocean,” Finsness told the Miami Herald. “After seeing this I was like, ‘What fireworks?’”

She wasn’t the only one. In the video, beachgoers can be heard exclaiming their surprise, with some calling it a “miracle” and others cheering on the little babies as they quickly waddled to the water.

At one point, at least one of the turtles can be seen going the wrong way before changing course and heading to the sea.

While this unexpected show left those at the beach full of wonder, it is a dangerous time for the little critters.

Hatchlings normally wait until nighttime to begin their trek, in hopes of avoiding predators or overheating, but everything in their path is an obstacle — from footprints to driftwood, according to SEE Turtles, an independent nonprofit based in Beaverton, Oregon, whose goal is to protect the species through ecotourism.

Once the turtles enter the water, they begin a “swimming frenzy” to get away from the shore and its potential predators. Their whereabouts will be unknown for up to a decade, but experts estimate only 1 in 1,000 hatchlings will survive to adulthood.

If they make it to adulthood, some can live for up to 50 years or more, according to the World Wildlife Fund, the world’s conservation organization.

Beach Crawling Doesn’t Tire Out Baby Sea Turtles- Turtle Treadmills, a Novel Test For Stamina - via Herp Digest

Hatchling sea turtles are sturdier than you may expect. They get their endurance from a stop-and-go crawling style. 

By James Gorman January 1, 2018 New York Times

To see video go to https://nyti.ms/2EruHaP

When baby sea turtles hatch on a beach at night, their instinct is to head to the sea. The beach slopes down, which is one directional clue they follow. Another is light: The horizon over the sea is brighter than the horizon over land.

But lights from towns and beach developments can distract the hatchlings. The sky glowing above a city can be disorienting, leading them to wander. And particularly bright lights can draw them away from the sea.

You’d think the extra time crawling might wear out hatchlings, which need energy once they get in the water to swim for about a day to get to their destination, the warm current of the Gulf Stream. In a normal sprint from nest to waves, the babies have been shown to build up chemicals that indicate they’ve been pushing themselves.

Sarah L. Milton, an associate professor of biology at Florida Atlantic University, and Karen Pankaew , a graduate student in biology, collected 150 loggerhead and green turtle hatchlings as they came out of the nests on beaches in Boca Raton, Fla. The researchers took the hatchlings to a lab, where they ran on a little treadmill and swam in a tank while their blood and breathing were monitored.

The surprise finding: As the researchers reported in the Journal of Experimental Biology, even after a couple of hours scrabbling the equivalent of about 500 yards, the turtles were fine by all measures and swam as well as turtles that didn’t have an extended crawling period.

The reason, apparently, is that they pause frequently in crawling if they are doing it for a long time, unlike the uninterrupted sprint they make when headed straight to the water. So disoriented turtles are not worn out.

Dr. Milton answered questions in a telephone interview about the research. Our interview, below, has been edited for clarity and length.

Q. This required a lot of late night work. Is that all on the part of your graduate students?

A: I’m always up for the first few nights because I have to train the graduate students. After that it was all on them, and they had a few volunteer undergraduate students to help as well. We actually had planned to have the turtles do an entire kilometer, but it just took so long. It turned out that the turtle could go that distance, but the graduate student couldn’t hang in there that long.

The turtles are snatched up right away and go to the lab where they’re on a treadmill. Do they get a rest before you release them?

They were held at a nearby nature center that we work with. They take them out, along with other hatchlings that have been mis-oriented that people bring to the nature center. Actually, they get a ride out on a boat when some of the local dive masters volunteer, and they take them out all at once and basically drop them off in the Gulf Stream.

How did you make such a small treadmill?

It’s a belt sander. We put a power coupling on it so that we could slow it down. Obviously, we don’t really want to be sanding the turtles. The crawling surface is actually hair scrunchies, so it would be soft and give them some traction.

It was tough on the graduate students, because they had to watch them the entire time. When the turtles were crawling, we’d have the treadmill on, but as soon as they stopped, you had to turn the treadmill off. And then as soon as they started crawling, you had to turn it on again. So it was very labor intensive to do the experiment.

What do the hatchlings do when they get to the Gulf Stream?

They settle into the weed lines, that’s what they’re aiming for. They can eat all the amphipods and things that are hanging out in the sargassum, and they just live there for the next several years.

Do your results mean we don’t have to worry about human lights?

They end up spending a lot longer on the beach than they otherwise would, both because they’re disoriented and because they’re stopping all the time. That makes them very vulnerable to predators.

There’s a lot of things out on the beach that like to eat baby sea turtles. Night birds, raccoons, foxes. And then also, they can end up being still on the beach in the morning when the sun comes up, which means they pretty much would just overheat and die.

There are some people who don’t think that turning off the lights, really, is going to do any good. But I can say from being out on the beach doing the study, it’s very clear that we would have one house that had a porch light on in the back or something like that, and the turtle would head straight for it.

It made me want to leave a note on their door: “Hi, you are personally responsible for the disorientation of 60 turtles last night.” So turning off the lights in the condominiums and in the houses really does make a difference.

The sky glow, though, is different. There’s not as much we can do about that, except basically at a societal level, just because there’s all the streetlights and it casts a glow in the sky. Anyone who lives in a big city can see that.

The Endangered Baby Turtles in Harvey’s Path - a Desperate Race to Save Them – via Herp Digest

Washington Post, 8/25/17 by Andrew deGrandpre

As storm surges drown eggs and rough surf strands weeks-old hatchlings, workers at Sea Turtle, Inc., a rescue and rehabilitation non-profit based on South Padre Island, are racing to save endangered sea turtles.

Rescue center staff began preparing for Harvey on Wednesday, collecting eggs from nests along 50 miles of beach from the Rio Grande River to Port Mansfield.

“We knew the surge would be significant enough that that the eggs would have been drowned, said Jeff George, Sea Turtle, Inc.’s executive director.

Once recovered, the eggs were placed in sand inside styrofoam coolers. They’re now incubating in a warm, dark room until they can be re-released after the hurricane.

On Saturday, staff will turn to the task of rescuing helpless baby turtles washed up on shore. Because it’s hatching season, hundreds of thousands of recent hatchlings are now riding the currents in the Gulf of Mexico. Ordinarily, the turtles would spend the first year to two years of life hiding in floating seaweed; once washed ashore, they have no way to fend for themselves against predators.

The first two stranded hatchlings that were rescued Wednesday. (Daniel Blue Tyx)

“We’re going to be driving in four-wheel-drive vehicles, going slowly looking for turtles that aren’t much bigger than the palm of your hand,” George said. “We could potentially see hundreds of post-hatchlings washed up on beaches.”

The first two stranded hatchlings have already taken up temporary residence at the Sea Turtle, Inc. rescue center. Reaching into a white utility sink in a back room, George pulled out a turtle in each gloved hand. One was a Hawksbill, just two to three weeks old, that the storm had carried far off course from its nesting beach in Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula.

The other was a critically endangered Kemp’s Ridley sea turtle, which nests only in northeast Mexico and the Texas Gulf Coast.

“This is the most endangered of all sea turtles,” George said. “These guys are out there at the mercy of the currents and storms.”

Turtle migration driven by hatchling drift experience

By Jonathan AmosScience correspondent, BBC News

Why do turtles migrate to the places they do? What is it that tells them where to swim as adults?

New research is providing some insight, suggesting the animals' experiences as little hatchlings adrift in ocean currents have a huge influence.

Scientists combined all the available satellite tracking data on adult turtles with models of how the world's sea water moves.

It shows that locations encountered in the earliest years are a powerful draw.

If these foraging sites are favourable and not too distant, the turtles will swim directly back to them as adults, time and time again.

If they are not suitable locations, the adults may simply not undertake migrations and just feed in the open ocean.

"The kind of information we're acquiring is important for designing effective conservation strategies," said Dr Rebecca Scott, who led the study soon to be reported in the journal Ecology.

read more

Hatchling lizards are smarter than you think - via Herp Digest

October 21st, 2013  (Phys.org) —A collaborative research team from Macquarie University and Sydney University have discovered that young (hatchling) lizards are capable of learning complex tasks, particularly if they hatched from eggs incubated at warmer temperatures.

The team, lead by Associate Professor Martin Whiting from Macquarie University's Lizard Lab, tested the intellectual abilities of 14 week-old three-lined skinks by challenging them to first remove a cap covering a 'well' to access a food-reward, and secondly to correctly identify which coloured cap shields the food-reward.

"In the final stage of the testing, we complicated the challenge for the lizards by switching the reward to a different container, with a different coloured lid," said Associate Professor Whiting.

"We found that the lizards did not rely on previous spatial locations to locate the reward, but could discriminate between the colours to identify where to look first.

"Some of the lizards we tested never really got it, but others solved every challenge we threw at them. Our results add to a growing body of literature that shows that at least sometimes, lizards can be far smarter than many scientists previously believed."

A key element of the study was to compare the learning rates and abilities of lizards that had been incubated in warmer compared to cooler temperatures, with the former performing more successfully overall.

"The lizards from the 'hot' incubation temperatures were generally larger, but even the largest 'cold' incubated hatchlings did not progress beyond the training phase. Therefore, success at the motor task was due to more than just body size," said Whiting.

"It looks like the temperature of a nest influences the problem-solving ability of a young lizard. These results are significant because they underlie the importance of an animals developmental environment on learning ability and cognition."

The research paper has been published in full online in the journal Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology.

More information: Benjamin, F. et al. (2013) Colour discrimination and associative learning in hatchling lizards incubated at 'hot' and 'cold' temperatures, Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology. link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs00265-013-1639-x

Provided by Macquarie University

Turtle Vocalizations as the First Evidence of Posthatching Parental Care in Chelonians - via Herp Digest

Journal of Comparative Psychology

1) Camila R. Ferrara, Richard C. Vogt, and 2) Renata S. Sousa-Lima

Online First Publication, October 22, 2012. doi: 10.1037/a0029656

CITATION

Ferrara, C. R., Vogt, R. C., & Sousa-Lima, R. S. (2012, October 22). Turtle Vocalizations as the First Evidence of Posthatching Parental Care in Chelonians. Journal of Comparative Psychology. Advance online publication. doi: 10.1037/a0029656

1) Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas da Amazônia, Manaus, Brazil

Renata S. Sousa-Lima

2) Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte and Cornell Lab

of Ornithology, Ithaca, New York

Until recently, freshwater turtles were thought to be silent reptiles, neither vocalizing nor hearing very well. We recorded individuals in nature, captivity, and during interactions between adults and hatchlings and show that hatchlings and adult turtles, Podocnemis expansa, produce sounds in and out of the water. Sounds were emitted by hatchlings inside the egg, in open nests, in the river, and in captive conditions.Adult females were recorded producing sounds in the river, while basking, while nesting, and in captivity. Females were recorded in the river approaching and responding to hatchling sounds. We detected 2,122 sounds, classified in 11 different types. These data suggest that there is sound communication between adults and hatchings and that these sounds may be used to congregate hatchlings with adults for mass migration. Hatchlings and females with transmitters were found migrating together. We consider these findings as the first evidence of acoustic communication mediating posthatching parental care in chelonians. We anticipate that our findings will influence the way turtle behavior is studied and interpreted, and add communication and sound pollution to turtle conservation concerns.

Keywords: turtles, sound, parental care, giant South American river turtle, Podocnemis exp

Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Richard C. Vogt, Coordenação de Pesquisa em Biologia de Água Doce e Pesca Interior, Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas da Amazônia, Caixa Postal 478, Manaus, AM, Brazil 69083-000. E-mail: vogt@inpa.gov.br and richard@pq.cnpq.br

Croc-a-bye baby! British zoo's delight as 24 dwarf crocodiles are successfully hatched

These baby dwarf crocodiles are part of a record breeding programme at Britain’s only crocodile zoo.

Shaun Foggett, who starred in successful television series Croc Man, is thrilled to have bred 24 dwarf caiman crocodiles with eight more to hatch any day now.

At Crocodiles Of The World in Witney, Oxfordshire, Mr Foggett has no problem handling these babies but that might change when they are fully grown, up to 4.9ft long.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2204879/Baby-dwarf-crocodiles-born-Crocodiles-World.html#ixzz26upmAFXn

Turtle tragedy...Thousands of Leatherback Sea Turtle Hatchlings Crushed to Death – via Herp Digest

 By Kim Boodram 

 Jul 8, 2012 Trinidad Express Newspapers - Thousands of leatherback hatchlings were crushed to death at the weekend as the Ministry of Works used excavators to redirect the Grande Riviere River, at the north east coast.

The Ministry had been called in when the river, running west, eroded most of the beach front, threatening the stability of several homes and hotels.

The community was horrified, though, when excavation work began Saturday without their knowledge on what is the most nest-intensive part of the beach.

Among those buildings under threat was the Mt Plaisir Estate Restaurant and Hotel, the most popular tourist accommodation during turtle nesting season.

The Ministry was called in two weeks ago by hotel owner Piero Guerrini.

The massacre that took place over the past two days was not the help that was expected.

"It is so unfortunate and there are so many mixed feelings," Guerrini said.

"This is a shock. On the one hand the erosion needed to be stopped but what has happened here is not right," he said.

Marc deVerteuil, of Papa Bois Conservation said the debacle could have been avoided with proper land zoning and co-ordination between relevant agencies.

Sherwin Reyz, a member of the Grand Riviere Environmental Organisation, spent yesterday salvaging those hatchlings that were still alive – and clearing the beach of hundreds of dead ones.

Brought to tears several times, Reyz contended that the river mouth could have been opened without that part of the beach being torn up.

"You think they had to do this?" Reyz said.

"This is the worst set of destruction I have ever seen by humans on turtles."

Reyz was among those in the community who began a rescue mission early yesterday and by evening had saved abut 500 hatchlings.

The babies were kept in a cool dugout area behind Mt Plaisir hotel, to be released last night.

Among them could be seen those who had been too badly injured and would clearly not make it.

On the beach, hundreds of eggs could be seen, some crushed and some rolling in the surf. Here and there, hatchlings could be seen fighting for life, some still partially in the shell.

Excavation work went on all day in what is classed by conservationists as zone four of Grande Riviere, which is just over a kilometre long and is the third most prolific sea turtle nesting site in the world.

Len Peters, head of Turtle Village Trust, said while yesterday's toll was unfortunate, much of the nesting area had already been lost to the river.

Peters said there was also sometimes a compromise to be made when animals and people share the same space. In this case, the welfare of the community had to be considered.

Peters said the weekend's tragedy should not have happened in the first place, since the river had started to swing west since December last year.

Repeated attempts to have the course redirected since then were futile, he said, and the Ministry waited too late to act.

"This intervention was necessary," Peters said.

"We would have lost more nesting space eventually. We didn't lose a lot of eggs, although this is an engineering disaster. At the very least, the EMA (Environmental Management Authority) should have been present to direct this operation."

Crocodile farmers feel bite as demand continues to fall (Sieam Bunthy) - via Herp Digest

PHNOM PENH POST (Cambodia) 5/21/12 The price of crocodile hatchlings in Siem Reap province has dropped drastically, and many local farmers are worrying about the future viability of crocodile farming. 

Tim Bunseng, a crocodile farmer in Siem Reap with around 200 female hatchlings, said the price he can get has dropped from US$23 to $24 to $17 in less than a week. 

Tim Bunseng speculated that the price will drop further because more hatchlings will be on the market soon, adding that he has only sold about 200 hatchlings this year, while last year he sold more than 2,000. 

Tim Bunseng said that eggs are laid once a year and the eggs start hatching from April to August and that most of the hatchlings are exported to sell in Vietnam. 

Chou Sedavuth, a crocodile farmer in Siem Reap and a buyer exporting crocodile hatchlings to Vietnam, said that the price is currently decreasing because of a drop in purchases. 

“I am worried because the price continues falling as we compete to sell [hatchlings], causing Vietnamese buyers cut down their buying to lower the price,” he said. 

Chou Sedavuth said that up until now, he had exported about 6,000 crocodile hatchlings to Vietnam. 

A fisheries official, who has asked not to be named, said that the number of exporters buying up hatchlings has dropped significantly, in turn causing the price to drop. 

Siem Reap, he said, has more crocodile farms than any other province, with approximately 300. 

In order to stabilise the market the Ministry of Agriculture is urging farmers to raise crocodiles for skins rather than selling them as hatchlings to Vietnam, he said. 

Crocodile farmers have reported falling prices since mid- to late-2011, when they blamed flooding for the decrease in the price of the animals.

A rare birth witnessed in Ocean Park

As revelers flocked to the island’s shores over the Fourth of July weekend, a lucky few witnessed a wonder of nature along a crowded stretch of beach at the edge of the sprawling capital city of San Juan.

Amid the ebb and flow of a packed day at the beach, dozens of endangered sea turtle hatchlings were born, emerging from their sandy nest after two months of incubation and heading straight to sea to the delight of people on hand to see the spectacle.

The daytime rush to the sea was unusual, as most hatches take place at night to improve the slim chances of survival for newborn turtles that are easy pickings for a range of predators.

The hatchlings were actually shepherded to the water by the thrilled crowd of people who had gathered to welcome them to the world.

The coastal fringe from Ocean Park to Isla Verde, ringed by condominium towers and hotels, boasts the most popular beach spots for tourists and metro area locals alike, drawing thousands of visitors on a daily basis.

Despite the crowds and development, the sandy stretch remains a prime nesting ground for sea turtles.

Local environmental officials, activists and community members work to protect these nesting grounds, where pregnant sea turtles haul themselves out of the sea to burrow into the sand to lay their eggs. Once hatched, the baby sea turtles emerge from the sand and quickly try to reach the sea for the start of a life’s journey that will take them thousands of miles around the Atlantic Ocean.

Incredibly, some species of sea turtles are believed to return to nest years later on the same stretch of coastline where they were born, although scientists remain uncertain on what underpins such an astute
system of navigation.

Few sea turtles make it to adulthood, facing threats from predators and human intervention before they are even hatched. Once hatched, the tiny sea turtles are seen as tasty morsels for a range of animals higher up the
food chain at sea, on land and from the air.

Litter, particularly discarded plastic, also poses a serious threat as sea turtles can mistake it for jellyfish, an important part of their diet.

By : KEVIN MEAD
http://www.caribbeanbusinesspr.com/news03.php?nt_id=59363&ct_id=1&ct_name=1