Whata Momma! She scaled a scarped dune and found a perfect nesting site — all with a probable injured or missing rear flipper (Shannon noted a definite “lopsided” gate in the turtle’s track). Three intact eggs were found at the base of the dune and were added to the very shallow clutch — additional indications that all was not quite right with this turtle’s flipper. Whatever her disability, she certainly knows how to pick a site and get the job done. Thanks to Susie, Cindy and Shannon for tidying up and documenting this amazing nest.

Ann and Lars were super surprised by finding not just one nest, but TWO about 50 feet from each other. Whoa! Talk about seeing double! Where to start?! Fortunately, Judi, Allison, Carol, and Carrie were patrolling nearby and joined in the exciting work of helping Ann and Lars relocate over 200 eggs to new sites. Great job, Everyone! Cheers to these “sister” nesters! Hope to see their return tracks in about 2 weeks.
[Thanks to Judi for great photos!]

Crawl to Nest 3

Folly Gothic at Nest 4

What a HOT, FUN time we all had learning about Folly’s turtles and their beach environment at Saturday’s Homecoming celebration. 75-80 folks, mostly kids as we hoped, came to the beach to “think like a turtle.”

Volunteers from Folly Beach Turtle Watch, Charleston Surfriders and Tideland Tours presented activities highlighting the differences between Loggerheads and Leatherbacks, the identification of what belongs on the beach and what doesn’t, and the importance of healthy dunes to sea turtle nesting, hatching and protection.

We also enjoyed an exciting puppet performance of “A Turtle Story” at the Folly Turtle Theater!

Thank you to ALL who were with us for welcoming Folly’s Turtles Home!

[More photos have been posted at "2012 Homecoming" under the "Photos" tab in the header menu above.]

Thanks to our local “bird guy,” the first loggerhead sea turtle tracks of Folly’s 2012 season have been identified, and thanks to our local “turtle guy,” Folly’s first nest has been confirmed. Welcome Home, Momma Loggerheads!

CELEBRATE FOLLY’s TURTLES!
Join in the FUN at our second
FOLLY TURTLES HOMECOMING CELEBRATION
ON THE BEACH at 4th Street EAST
from 9:30-11:30 on SATURDAY, MAY 5th.

There will be NO live sea turtles present on the beach with us, but you can
expect a FUN time learning what it’s like to BE a sea turtle on Folly Beach.

There will be lots of activities about Loggerheads and Leatherbacks, about Nesting, Protecting, and Hatching, and what it takes to have a safe beach for sea turtles to use.

Activities are designed for kids 5-10, but all ages are welcome.

Please pre-register via email to homecoming@follyturtles.com.
The first 100 to register are guaranteed a special thank you.

We’re a bit baffled, but so very thankful for the interest of an Indiana resident who has very generously and anonymously supported Folly’s turtles since 2011. Your gifts will go a long way in helping to protect sea turtles here on Folly through educating others. Please know how grateful we all are. Your kindness touches us deeply. Thank you.

Finding a good nesting site will be very difficult for sea turtles on Folly Beach this season.

Sand loss caused by Hurricane Irene last August has been devastating. Winter and early Spring have brought no noticeable natural beach accretion, and Folly doesn’t expect to have federal funding for beach nourishment until at least 2013.

So … what’s a turtle to do?

Little sand and lots of new obstacles will complicate their process: new timber seawalls, new mountains of rock revetment, piles of sand bags, upside down Christmas trees, old uncovered seawalls, boats and even houses are now “in the way” of successful nesting.

A lot of exhausting false crawls are expected as momma turtles do their best to find a nest site.

Please do what you can to prevent more obstacles from appearing on the beach (remove all items & fill holes), and to increase sand on Folly’s beach (contact your Congress persons to request funding for renourishment).

Thanks for your help in making life easier for the turtles on their beach.

Anonymous New Year’s gifts have reached us from that same wonderful Indiana zip code. To our Kind Patron: we are so appreciative and will put your generous gifts to good use “for the turtles” as you requested. Thank you!

After an incredible season of nests, nests and more nests, Folly was raked by Hurricane Irene in August. TONS of sand left the beach along with 11 nests. Nature has quite a powerful way of reminding us of yin yang. Despite the end-of-season downer, 2011 was successful.
Here’s a summary …

A record 82 nests (previous high was 63 nests in 2008) were laid.
We relocated 49 nests (60%) to avoid NORMAL tidal inundation.

We lost 14 nests: 2 to July high tides that wiped out their dune, 11 to Irene, and 1 to unknown forces. There were no signs of disturbance or predation, just 0 eggs found after repeated well-dug attempts to find for inventory. Poached? No proof, so it remains unknown. If you’d like to know which nests were lost, please post a comment or email.

Nest success was 71.9% sending 5,547 hatchlings to the ocean, about 500 fewer than in 2008 even though we had a few more nests.

Average clutch size was 120.5 eggs and average incubation was 53.8 days for both in situ and relocated clutches. Incubation time indicates nest temperature which determines hatchling gender. Having the same incubation time for in situ and relocated nests indicates that we’re not influencing sex-determination when we relocate nests.

DNA study results are fascinating and available on seaturtle.org under Folly Beach’s entry. Folly had SEVERAL turtles that laid 4-5 nests ONLY on Folly this season — our faithful girls. We’ll be posting an article about them soon.

Folly also had a record number of strandings this season — 11. Two of those were live Kemp’s Ridley sea turtles that were cared for by the Sea Turtle Hospital at the SC Aquarium. One recovered and was released quickly; the other (Edge) unfortunately died from head trauma. The 9 dead strandings included 2 more Kemp’s Ridleys and 7 loggerheads, some with fatal-looking wounds and debilitation, but some with no obvious indication of why they died.

Yin yang … as always.

2012 has arrived on the calendar and as the days get longer and warmer, our thoughts are becoming more focused on this new year’s turtle season. We hope you’ll join us in person or via the web to see what Nature brings. Thanks so much for your interest and for supporting sea turtles everywhere.

We were recently surprised by a very nice check from seaturtle.org.

What’s this?
Proceeds from Folly nest adoptions!

How wonderful! 18 Folly nests were adopted by YOU. Thank you!!
We hope you’ll consider further adoptions in 2012. Your “adoption fee” goes to nest protection supplies, educational outreach efforts, and a small service charge to seaturtle.org for managing all the data. Again, our thanks for your support!