When the Big Boys (and Girl) Came to Town (sea turtles that is)

Once again the Georgia Sea Turtle Center has gifted us with a very special event, the release of some beautiful "rehabbed" Sea Turtles.  Thankfully I returned from Tennessee in time to see this.  These turtles were found in Florida waters, and therefore must be released into Florida, although a few strong swimming strokes and they could easily be back in Georgia.

Our work here is so involved with the hatchlings that sometimes we have to be reminded that these little guys do grow up, and rather quickly that first year.  The first and smallest was Duval, a juvenile Green Turtle, so named because it was found in Duval County down in the Jacksonville area.  When found, Duval had been weak, but after receiving treatment, is now well enough to go back into the sea.  It is important to get them back into the water before the water temperatures get any colder.

There was quite a crowd of the curious, and supporters of the Sea Turtle work, gathered to launch these very special visitors.  Many of the Turtle Patrol Volunteers were in attendance, as were some Jacksonville TV stations.

The Green Turtles have such beautiful markings on their flippers, back and especially their heads.

How many ways can you release a Sea Turtle into the water?

Several ways, but they all seem to involve getting wet.  The small ones are always taken out into the water far enough that they can make it beyond the surf without getting tossed around too much.

This is Marti who is almost adult size.  I believe it had the Pappilloma Virus which infects a lot of the Green Turtles and if left untreated can be fatal.  This virus has not been seen very much in our area but as with most infectious viruses it is now spreading here.  The virus is one of the Herpes type viruses.

Dr. Terry Norton is the head of the Georgia Sea Turtle Center a rehabilitating hospital on Jekyll Island.  He is right there overseeing each step of this release but letting his young assistants learn with a hands-on approach. We had a bit of excitement at the edge of the water as between the first and second release a fairly large, 5' or so, shark was in about a foot of water just beside the last people who were standing in the water's edge, waiting on the release.

Quite a handful.  The Green Turtles are herbivores, eating only plants, algae, mosses, etc.

It almost looks like our young assistant is going to do a little turtle boogie-boarding as the waves begin to break around her.  After a few tries Marti was on his way.

Then it was time for the "Big Girl', Squall.  Each turtle is named for an event, a place, or a person who is involved in finding them and getting them to the Center for treatment.  Squall had lost her right front flipper to a shark bite.  She was found by the Georgia Bulldog Boat which was out doing turtle studies, with fresh shark bites to her flipper and plastron.  After receiving treatment, including antibiotics, they felt she was ready to go back into the wild.  It took a lot of people to carry this big girl to the water.  The staff had evidently made going away signs for their recent charges with well wishes and signed by all.

With the adult turtles of this size, they like for them to make their own way into the water.  She sat for a while studying the situation.  Then she was ready to move slowly ahead, for the first time, with only one flipper.

We know that this is a female because she dropped some of her eggs in her holding tank.  X-rays and ultrasound showed she still had eggs inside.  She was given a drug to stimulate her to drop the rest of her eggs.  I wonder what they did with them.  Dragging that heavy body across the sand without the aid of that right flipper was much more difficult.

I love the rich colors of the Loggerhead and their big, big head.  That was why I choose the Loggerhead for my subject this year for the Turtle Trot T-Shirt.  Although the Green Turtles have pretty patterns on their heads they always look like their head is a bit undernourished to me in comparison to their body.  The Greens do grow to be larger than the Loggerheads by about a 100 pounds.

The water will help with the weight as she will become more buoyant once she can get a bit deeper.  Probably 95% or more of our Sea Turtles are Loggerheads, although we are getting more and more Greens and Leatherbacks these days than in the past.

Turtles have such beautiful eyes.  The red which is on her wound and her mouth is Red Algae and not blood.  It is not harmful.  Sea Turtles do not have teeth but the Loggerhead which does eat crustaceans as well as plants has a crushing bite with this massive parrot-like beak.  Since the Greens are strictly herbivores they don't need such a massive beak.

Her friend and mentor, Dr. Norton, slowly escorts her, correcting her path when she gives in to the less strong side with the missing flipper.

Good luck Squall, you big, beautiful girl!!  I hope I see your tracks on our beach in the near future.  It will be a distinctive track for sure.  Although with the Loggerhead, their back flippers leave most of the track imprints, we often see them have unusual and distinctive tracks telling us that they may be missing all or part of a flipper, but usually its a rear one.  A Loggerhead is a bit testy and will chase a shark, but sometimes get caught off guard when approached from the rear as they come up for a breath.

In she goes.  Her small tracking device attached to her back will help in a study with which the Turtle Center is involved in which turtles with disabilities like Squall has.

I am sure she is happy to be home.

I only put this photo in because I saw one of "my" older Turtle Trot T-Shirts on the assistant with the bullhorn from the Amelia Island Sea Turtle Watch.

We thought we had seen the last of Squall until a few minutes later, when someone spotted her.  With that missing flipper, she had taken a right curving track, and her path became a semi-circle back to shore.

Dr. Norton and his crew quickly ran to the rescue.

It seems she will have a bit of re-learning to do as she manages with a physical handicap such as this, but I am sure she will learn to compensate and will fare just fine.  In a few days you will be able to track her progress on the Sea Turtle Center's website, link>> Look for Squall, (there are three active Loggerhead signals).  The Georgia Turtle Center staff stands and watches this time, to be sure that she is not going to come back in, but it looks like she is on course, and out to sea.

September High Spots

September High Spots

Strong winds which blew for 3 days straight with Fall high tides and very high rough seas have put the final end to our turtle season for the year, washing away all the last nests.  The last one on the island was to have hatched this week and it is unlikely it survived either.  So our season ends on a whimper rather then a happy note.  One little miracle left from Irene was that 3 eggs someone found laying on the beach were left laying beside the stakes for one of the nests.  Len who watches that area of beach carefully took them and reburied them high at the base of a dune.  Even though the odds were next to nil that they would hatch, small miracles do happen and all three hatched together and all got to the water.   

We are going to fast forward through September because there is just too much going on to ever catch up in detail.  I was able to get a few fun reflections in the Marina while we waited to head out on a speedy trip across the sound on one of the Amelia River Cruise outings.  There were several, with some of the three Workshop groups we had in the month.

Their newest boat captain is not quite into the pace of things here on the island, and hasn't quite got the hang of what "Island Time" is all about.  Being former military, he is still caught up in punctuality and feels he had to leave precisely on time and get back on time.  An hour cruise is just that with him.  I guess we were spoiled with Capt. P. J. Dave and Kevin who just go with the flow and what seems like a good schedule at the time taking advantage of the tides and a little sense of adventure always eager to explore what's just around the bend.

We did get to see the birds in hot pursuit of the Shrimpboat scarfing up the by-catch that is thrown overboard by the Shrimpers.

The Marsh grasses are a very beautiful green right now with their peak production of seeds topping off the plants to make every thing look to be the bright Spring or early summer colors you would normally see in new tree leaf growth. In reality, the marsh plants are nearing the end of their cycle.  Very soon, these seeds will ripen into a beautiful gold color, giving our islands their name, The Golden Isles.  Sometime you should read the poem "The Marshes of Glynn", written about the marshes just north of us up in Brunswick in Glynn County, Georgia.

Heading up the familiar route to Beach Creek on the South End of Cumberland Island in search of horses, we didn't get a very good view of the horses on the way, but did get to see some birds.  This Osprey seems to be saying his evening Prayers as it is becoming time when the birds will all be finding that perfect roost for the night.

Two of our most well-behaved sailing friends on this trip were these two regular visitors to the island.  They hardly moved the entire trip.

For a few days earlier in the month of September the fires reignited up in the Okefenokee Swamp surprising us with a couple of mornings of the heavy smell of smoke.  Then torrential rains soaked us with more than 3 inches in the rain gauges inside the park in one period of couple of hours.

Another few days we had an old fashioned Nor'easter blowing us away at least on the beach.  It did not do much beach damage but was interesting to experience and see this contrast in the usually sunshiny calm ocean side.

The winds on the river washed the sea over our remaining nests once again.  The excavations proved out our worst fears with only 6 surviving out of two nests one in one morning's digs.  Most of us are expecting the worst so haven't even wanted to post them for onlookers to see.  It is very distressful end for what was such an exciting season.

Another bright spot of happiness at my house was the emergence of our one surviving Swallowtail.  It was smaller than the other one which had developed naturally outside and turned into a Chrysalis at the nursery.  I have learned much about caring for these guys this year.  I think that it is better to leave the plants outside where they receive good healthy sunlight in which to grow with this type of Caterpillar.  I believe that the health of the plant plays a big part in the healthy and successful development of the Swallowtail caterpillars.  In the future with my new plants growing in my garden I will have some healthy food growing for them to eat by just keeping them supplied with fresh cuttings.  I do know that left outside something eats the caterpillars.  I suspect it is the tiny wasps which I found swarming my caterpillar denuded Passion Flower when all of the dozens of them disappeared overnight outside.

I had one amazing morning with clouds that just made you want to become a bird so you could freely explore the illusive mountains the overhead moisture had created.

The glow from behind the rain cloud was amazing and photographs just cannot do justice to such a panoramic display.

A flock of Great White Egrets soared in front of them with their tucked-back necks, unlike the Woodstorks and Roseate Spoonbills who seem to stretch out their necks as far as they can reach.

A very hated kind of flying device lays burst into shreds by the high altitude it had obtained before falling to the water below, hence becoming beach trash, which gulls will start to eat, but choke and can't expel.  Worse yet, they can be an appetizing bite full of death for some sea turtle who mistakes this tentacled balloon remnant for a Jelly, one of their favorite foods, or wrapping its ribbons around some swimming sea bird.

The reflections on the low tide shoreline mirrored the already overwhelming beauty.

I stop, as I tear myself away from the beauty and head back, for one last glimpse from the river side and catch the sun almost peeking out, giving me some great light column rays before it rises above the clouds to become just another partly sunny day.

In September one thing that we fishermen look for is the great schools of Mullet which form in the river's waters as part of their mating ritual.  The Cormorant was much closer to shore and as with the larger fish may have been drawn toward the ripples the Mullet make as they move in-sinc near the surface and which means fish for dinner.  Some people won't eat Mullet except smoked, which is considered a delicacy, but some say there are ways to cook them that make them very tasty.  Smoked Mullet I like but have not had them any other way.  When they are like this you catch them with a casting net and the small ones are for bait, but have seen some quite large ones caught that way also.

The welcome moisture of the recent rains from the night before, and the still-high humidity give more sun rays to enjoy on the road back to the equipment barn.  It is rare that this happens but when it does it is nice to have your camera handy.  There is just something heavenly about is, you almost expect to hear an angel choir humming in the background.

The beach has been filled with birds.  Lots that we don't see up on our end of the beach very much in the summertime.  There was a flock of small birds which may be a species of Plovers migrating through, and lots of the Black Skimmers.

Here are a bunch of smaller birds who seemed to be catching up on their zzzz's.  These could be a different species or an immature version.

The Skimmers have such interesting beaks with their splash of vivid red orange across the massive beak.  The smaller birds mixed in here seem to be different from the others and look more like the Plovers with the dark necklace.  I am not a true birder, knowing all the varieties of birds that are not the more common ones.

I do know what this fellow is though but I am not so sure he does.  Methinks he may have decided he is a Sea Turtle for today.  Maybe this is a bit of 'devolution', returning to the sea and trying to find those flippers.  For this one, though, he will be stuck with his claws.  He strolled along the escarpment until he found an easy access to the water.

Then he headed straight for the surf.

Quite the eager little boy to try to get to it.  Once there, it seemed to lay down and let the water come up around and looked like possibly drank some.  It had rained very hard the night before so it was not thirst which drove him to the water.  I had experienced this once before on the ocean side and had waded in and rescued the Tortoise for fear it would drown.  This time I just wanted to observe because with the river waves I could easily intervene if it became necessary.

The waves kept coming in and leaving but the turtle wadded even deeper.

At this point it was just kind of doggie-paddling and yet holding its head above the water's surface.

After being washed around a bit it got its footing once again and headed back toward the dunes.  Very interesting behavior which has the experts scratching their heads and saying we didn't think they did this.  I guess when you live right next door to the sea it is just impossible to resist its call even if you are supposed to live in the desert like dunes.  Possibly this one may have had some pests under the shell, he needed to clean them out.

Another of the many beautiful sunrise mornings, which have been a mix of some great and some mediocre gray.

This is the beginning of a large 6 foot by 2 foot commission piece.  The drawing is almost complete and I am adding a heavy layer of a Masking agent, kind of like Rubber Cement, to the plants, Lily Pads, and Koi fish before painting in the watery background.  The reason is that the darker colors I will be using for the water will be hard to cover for the white areas and lighter areas of the foreground.  Also I want the water to be very wet looking and I will spray the paint with water to make it run and drip to convey the water.  That way I don't have to figure out later and draw on top of the paint, since will have already decided where, for the most part, things will be.

I leave you with one more of the really nice sunrises.  The Black Skimmers are much more skittish than the regulars who have gotten used to me cruising by in my quite noisy buggy.  They fly up, giving another dimension with their black silhouettes against the pastel colors of the background.  Just the reverse of my painting with the foreground parts being the light places.  Different moods different views. Keep me in your thoughts and help Bruce keep the gallery running smoothly (but don't let him touch the painting) while I travel to my mom's for her 90th birthday.  You see I have my reasons for trying to hurry ahead.  The Fall colors will be waiting to find their way back to you.  We'll see if my "ESP" endowed mom will really be surprised by all that is in store for her this week.  This is the best kept secret our family has ever pulled off with Niece Julie directing the whole thing.  She commanded a year ago that everyone in the family had to be there and I think that will be the case.