CRESCENT BEACH, Fla — Crescent Beach Turtle Patrol has a record-breaking 72 turtle nests right now.
The patrol states that usually this time of year they don’t see new nests being laid, but beaches to the North and South of Crescent are still seeing new nests.
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Another record for the patrol is the 8 green sea turtle nests. The most recorded in past years was only 2 nests.
Typically, green sea turtles are more at home in the warmer waters to our south. They are also “late nesters”. They don’t arrive until late into the season, July and August.
At this pace, after many bad storms, the patrol will be going on until late October or possibly longer.
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“In our recent storm Idalia, even though it was a mild one, we lost one nest on Crescent Beach due to a full moon coinciding with a high tide and on-shore winds which is never a good combination,” said the turtle patrol in a recent Facebook post.
“This nest was naturally laid in the driving lane and it had washed over several times before the storm. We are not permitted to intervene with Mother Nature so we cannot move a nest because of an impending storm. Mama sea turtles nest several times during the season to hedge their bets, at least one nest has a chance to emerge.”
Crescent Beach’s current stats:
- We have successfully relocated 45 nests due to the beach renourishment project
- About 75% of the 72 nests have hatched
- 5105 Hatched eggs
- On average Mommas have laid 115 eggs per nest
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