We are excited to share that the Edisto Beach State Park has found the first nest of the season on our 1.5 mile beach. The nest was found on May 10th by our volunteer, Krystal and her daughter! They were very excited to celebrate Mother's Day with a nest! They also recorded two false crawls found as well. See below for pictures from the first nest. The first nest in South Carolina was found on Lighthouse Island on May 1st. So we knew that we would get our first nest any day.
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Here is to the start of the sea turtle nesting season! Stay tuned for more turtle updates!

Good Morning Blog Readers,

Sorry I have been so MIA this season, it has just been so busy!

Well, our season is officially wrapped up today. I will be inventorying the last nest (that has reached it's 70th day of incubation) this morning once the rain and thunder recede.

We had a very successful season, with our 351 loggerhead nests. We lost approximately 15 nests to Hurricane Dorian, which considering the impact, is not too bad. We did have 7 nests emerge post-Dorian and although they were not super successful, it was amazing to have at least a few hatchlings make it out after all of those high tides.

To see more statistics on our nesting season you can visit the link below to be taken to our beach page on seaturtle.org, which is an online database where we enter all of our nest information.

So what are my plans this off-season? Well, I am currently training to run the Charleston Marathon on January 11th 2020! I am excited to be tackling this goal of mine. I am planning on using this race as a fundraiser for our turtle project, so stay tuned for more information once I get it all set-up.

Thanks for your support for our turtle program! 

Our last night walk of the season was held on Tuesday. We only run the night walks in June and July as that is the peak of the nesting season as well as our interns are leaving shortly. They have been a lot of fun and fairly successful this season!

On our last night walk, we got to see one straggler leave from nest 92. Cadey, our intern, helped it out as it was stuck in the roots and got left behind from the rest of the hatchlings. A little bit further down the beach and we got to see nest 94 emerge! They were already heading from the nest and unfortunately were having a hard time finding the ocean as it was near the new moon and the horizon was not the brightest point. Our volunteers and myself were able to reorientate them and save them from heading back towards the lights across the marsh.

The following morning, our patrol team found that 6 nests had emerged! 

What a great way to end our night walk program this year! Thanks for all of the support for our turtle program. 

What an amazing season it has been and we could not have done it without the help of our interns! They did an amazing job of marking nests, leading patrols, leading night walks and educating the public. They are almost done their internship as they head back to school soon. Shown in the picture below is our two sea turtle interns, Cadey and Chloe and our environmental learning center intern, Hannah. Thanks again for your enthusiasm and hard work this season!

It was the last night walk for our intern, Chloe, and she was in charge of leading the presentation and the walk. She did a great job in finding us hatchlings! We got to see hatchlings make their way to the ocean. Unfortunately with the new moon, the horizon was very dark and was not the brightest point so our hatchlings were getting disorientated. Thankfully everyone was helping out and letting us know when they found a confused hatchling. 

The following morning, our patrol team found four nests had emerged! 

Our night walk program was led by our intern, Cadey. Not too far into the walk there was a dark object emerging from the ocean, in between Cadey and our night walk group. We held the group and turned off our flashlights. The turtle emerged during the dark night and crawled well above the tide line. After several minutes, I crawled up to see what stage of nesting she was at. She was still digging her egg chamber so we waited patiently. During that time, three raccoons tip-toed up near the dunes towards the turtle. I was nervous they would startle her but as soon as they saw me they quickly ran away. 

Once she started to lay, the group was able to see her closer. Our group grew in numbers as more and more individuals came from the campground. We got to witness her lay her eggs, cover and then return to the ocean. 

The following morning the patrol team, Chloe and Nona, found two new nests and 1 hatched nest (pictures to be posted soon). The nest from the night walk is nest 341 on our state park beach. If you would like to adopt the nest, click on the button below to be taken to the adoption page. The unique ID of nest 341 is: 267874. Part of the proceeds goes back towards our turtle program.

We were unable to walk last night after Chloe finished the presentation, as there was a thunderstorm that hit Edisto. The following morning, there were no new turtle nests or false crawls. The morning team, Cadey and Lea, discovered three nests emerged. 

We are hosting an inventory program tonight (7/24) at 6:30 p.m., where we go to a nest that has hatched and we dig it up to see the success rate. We count the hatched eggs, unhatched eggs and sometimes there are hatchlings still below! So come on out to hopefully get the chance to witness a sea turtle hatchling and to learn more about our Edisto sea turtles.

​We had an eventful night walk last night! We ran into a what seemed like the same picky turtle a few different times. She came up onto the beach and false crawled before she got past the tide line each time. But we got to catch her crawl back into the water. We also came across the one nest we had on our beach last night but the turtle had already come and gone. We caught a beautiful moon rise as well!


The following morning our patrol team marked the nest we saw, found 8 false crawls, and 3 hatched nests!

If you would like to adopt the new nest found, 338, click on the button below to be taken to the adoption page. The unique ID for nest 338 is: 266901. Part of the proceeds goes back towards our turtle program. 

On Thursday our intern, Chloe, led the presentation and was going to lead the walk but there was a wicked storm nearby. The lightning was like the paparazzi with all of the flashes. With our unpredictable South Carolina storms, we decided to call off the walk. I took a quick walk down to the campground and back but did not find any turtle activity.

The next morning our intern, Cadey, and volunteers, Nona and Ashby, found 2 new nests, 6 false crawls and 1 nest hatched. The new nests are 335 and 336 on our state park beach. If you would like to adopt one of the nests, then click on the button below to be taken to the adoption page. The unique ID's are: 266398 & 266402. Part of the proceeds goes back towards our turtle program.

We made a long trek to the inlet without any turtle activity but enjoyed a beautiful walk under the full moon. On the way back we got to witness the turtle laying nest 330! While watching the turtle lay her eggs, we witnessed another turtle emerging from the ocean down the way. We had to quietly pass by this turtle by the waterline when we walked back to the park office.

The following morning, our patrol team had a busy day! They found the two new nests, one false crawl and one nest emerged. They also had to install several light screens and conduct a few inventories.

If you would like to adopt nest 330 from our night walk program, click on the button below to be taken to the adoption page. The unique ID of nest 330 is: 265568. Part of the proceeds goes back towards our turtle program.

On Saturday, we ended the walk early due to lightning so no turtle activity was seen. The next morning our turtle patrol found 1 new nest, 2 false crawls and 4 nests that hatched. The one new nest was one unlike any I have found on our state park beach before. This turtle crawled up and dug up an incubating nest. The posts and the screen did not hinder her in digging. She destroyed 100 eggs from nest 145 during her nesting process. When we dug down to find the new eggs and to clear out the broken eggs, we still found incubating eggs from nest 145 below. Hopefully the eggs did not get too badly disturbed and are still viable, time will tell. 

If you would like to adopt the one nest found, nest 320, click on the button below to be taken to the adoption page. The unique ID for nest 320 is: 264863. Part of the proceeds goes back towards our turtle program.

We had a short but sweet walk to a turtle that was emerging at very low tide. We waited patiently for her to crawl above the high tide line. Our intern, Cadey and myself checked on her periodically to see when she started to lay her eggs. Once she started laying, our group was able to get a closer look and watch her lay, cover and return. She had damage to the back of her shell, which gave us a closer look at the eggs dropping into the egg chamber, it was such an amazing sight!

The next morning, our intern Chloe, and volunteer, Nona, located the eggs and marked this nest as 315 on our state park beach. If you would like to adopt this nest, click on the button below. The unique ID of nest 315 is: 264304. Part of the proceeds from the nest adoption goes back towards our turtle patrol!

We were so excited to see nest 15 emerge last night during our night walk program! After the presentation, we walked for just a short while until I found a few hatchlings emerging from the surface. We waited (patiently) for nest 15 to "boil" and we were so delighted when upwards of 100 hatchlings made their crawl from the nest to the ocean. 

Last night was a busy time for hatchling emergences as 11 nests were found to have hatched this morning. There were also three new nests! These nests are 309, 310 and 311 on our state park beach. If you would like to adopt one of these nests, click on the button below to be taken to the adoption page. The unique ID's for nest 309, 310 and 311 are: 263366, 263371 and 263375. Part of the proceeds from the nest adoption goes back towards our turtle program. The turtles and I thank you for the support!

We had a long walk to the inlet under a beautiful starry sky. I checked the possible nests for hatching with no luck of seeing any little ones. On the way back, we were nearing the white office building when I got a red flashing signal. Campers were on the beach and spotted a nesting turtle. They kept a great distance of 30 feet. I checked on her and she had started to lay already so the night walk group was able to watch her lay her eggs and then cover and return.

The next morning, our patrol marked the nest as 293 on our state park beach. If you would like to adopt this nest, click on the button below. The unique ID to adopt the nest is: 262493. Part of the proceeds from the nest adoption goes back towards our turtle program. 

The turtles and our patrol team thank you for the support!

Today there were 14 new nests found! Our intern, Cadey, and volunteers, Ashby and Nona, were busy with all of the new activity. The current record of 12 was set earlier this season on June 18th. With finding 14 new nests today we are closing in on the 300 mark! We are currently at 286 nests and still have a month of nesting. Will we reach 350? Stay tuned to find out.

We had a beautiful and very warm, night walk last night. Unfortunately we did not get to see a sea turtle. There were a couple false crawls but the turtle had long since gone.

The following morning our dawn patrol team found 1 new nest and 8 false crawls. So our chances of seeing a nesting turtle were slim. The nest they found is 266 on our state park beach. See below for a couple photos taken this morning.

If you would like to adopt nest 266, click on the button below to be taken to the adoption page. The unique ID of this nest is: 259430. Part of the proceeds from the nest adoption goes back to our turtle program! 

We had a beautiful walk to the inlet and back but we had yet to see a turtle. Right in front of the white office building, where we started the walk, was a turtle egg chambering. We waited until she was laying her eggs and then got a closer look. We got to see her lay her eggs, cover and then return to the ocean. 

The next morning our patrol marked this nest as 249 on the state park beach. See the pictures below of the body pit, egg sample and marked nest. If you would like to adopt this nest, click on the button below. The unique ID to adopt the nest is: 258075. Part of the proceeds from the nest adoption comes back to our turtle program.

Our record for the most amount of nests found in a season was set in 2016 with 240 nests! We broke the record of 240 before June was done! On Saturday we found 12 new nests bringing our total to 248 on the state park beach. We are so excited to see how many nests we end up with once the turtles have finished nesting.

We had a wonderful night walk on Thursday as we got to witness a nesting loggerhead sea turtle under a starry sky and with a wonderful breeze to keep the bugs at bay. We got the chance to witness her laying her eggs, cover her nest and return to the ocean. The following morning myself and our volunteer, Nona, had a busy start to our day! We found 11 new nests on the state park beach, bringing our total to 235! We are nearing closer to our record of 240, will we beat it tomorrow? Tune back in to the blog to find out when we pass our record number of nests.

The turtle we saw last night, laid nest 229 on our state park beach. See below for pictures taken during morning patrol. If you would like to adopt this nest, click on the button below to be taken to the adoption page. The unique ID for nest 229 is: 256981. Part of the proceeds from the nest adoption goes back to our program! The turtles and our patrol group thank you for the support.

We had a beautiful night to walk the beach in search of a nesting loggerhead sea turtle. We had a clear sky and a lot of bioluminescence glowing at the waterline. Unfortunately, we did not get to witness a turtle on our walk. The following morning they only found one new nest and two false crawls, so the odds were against us in seeing one. The nest they found marks nest 221 on the state park beach. If you would like to adopt this nest, click on the button below to be taken to the adoption page. The unique ID for this nest is: 255938.

Part of the proceeds from the nest adoption goes back to our turtle program. See below for pictures taken from the morning patrol by our volunteer, Lea. 

​Thanks for your support for our night walk program and nest adoptions!

We had an amazing night walk on Thursday! We only had to walk a short distance until seeing a turtle lay eggs, cover and return to the ocean. However, this turtle was nesting in the campground beach access! We made sure to rope it off that night to avoid anyone walking over the body pit before we marked it off in the morning.

Our turtle was a smaller-sized loggerhead so perhaps she was a newer nesting turtle. When she started to cover her nest we noticed she was glowing! She had some bioluminescence on her shell that glowed every time she threw sand. It was a beautiful sight to see!

This turtle laid nest 194 on our Edisto Beach State Park. I included more pictures from the morning patrol. If you would like to adopt the nest, click on the button below to be taken to the adoption page. The Unique ID for the nest is: 253447

We were very happy to reach 200 nests this morning! Only 41 more nests to break the record, let's go turtles!

We walked to the inlet under an almost full moon! There was a breeze keeping the bugs at bay and we had turtle tracks to see. We came across a couple new nests and false crawls but no turtle until our trek on the way back. We saw this turtle make her slow crawl back to the ocean after crawling ashore without nesting. She was missing part of her back flipper, so I am sure she will have a tough time trying to dig an egg chamber. However, these turtles are pretty tough so I am sure she will find a way!

The next morning our intern, Chloe, and our volunteers, Bill & Iddy, found 6 new nests and 9 false crawls. The new nests are 182, 183, 184, 185, 186 & 187. See below for a few pictures from the morning patrol. If you would like to adopt one of these nests, click the button below to be taken to our adoption page. The Unique ID's for the nests are: 252043, 252045, 252061, 252062, 252063 & 252067.

Part of the proceeds from the nest adoption goes back to our turtle program! The turtles thank you for the support!

We are excited to share that we broke the morning nest count record! The maximum number of nests we had found before was in 2016 when we had 10 nests in one morning. Yesterday we found 12, breaking the record by two nests. This season is looking like a banner year so it will be interesting to see if we break this daily nest record again!

​See below for a couple pictures from morning patrol. I was joined by our two volunteers, Bill & Iddy. We were out on the beach past 11 a.m. as we also had to relocate two nests as well! The turtles are keeping us busy.

We walked all the way to the inlet and got a glimpse of a sea turtle returning after successfully laying a nest. We were excited to get to witness the whole process on our walk back. We got to witness a turtle laying and covering close to the white building where we started! The turtle wanted to ensure we got our daily steps in!

The windless night led to many bug bites but it was worth it to see this beautiful sight. By the time the turtle finished it was after midnight and was technically "World Turtle Day", how fitting! This turtle laid nest 156 on our state park beach. The following morning our intern, Cadey, and volunteer, Tori, found 9 new nests on the state park beach. See below for pictures of the nest. To adopt nest 156, click the button below to be taken to our adoption page. The Unique ID of this nest is: 251670

Part of the proceeds from the nest adoption goes back to our turtle program! We thank you for the support.

We had a beautiful walk to the inlet with only a couple false crawl activities. We were still staying positive to hopefully get the chance to witness a sea turtle. On the way back from the inlet we found another false crawl but no sea turtle. The following morning, Chloe and our volunteer, Nona, found four new nests and two false crawls. I have included pictures below from the morning patrol. The new nests found were: 145, 146, 147 & 148. If you would like to adopt one of the nests, the unique ID codes are: 249647, 249650, 249660 & 249662. 

Part of the proceeds from our nest adoptions goes back to our turtle program. Click the button below to be taken to the adoption page. We appreciate all of the support for our sea turtles!