Day 12 - Sea Turtles

Day 12
2-14-14

Friday was Valentine's Day - one year to the day since our decision to move to Costa Rica.

Kyle gave me the gift of going out at night with a local conservation group to view sea turtles nesting. Since Ryan had her first babysitting job, he felt that one of us should be here in case she needed something. So I went off by myself and it was an incredible experience. Nothing at all like I expected.

Let me first say, we were not allowed to speak or take photos - it was a silent experience and only infrared light was used by the guides so that we could see. So the photos I will include are not my own.

When we arrived at the beach, we followed two sets of sea turtle tracks from the ocean to their nesting site. We have all seen these turtle tracks in the sand before, but most of us didn't know what they were. They just look like big tire tracks.

Each set of tracks led to a black sea turtle making her nest to lay her eggs. It is an enormous amount of work. They first make a five foot wide hole using their flippers and rotating their body, then they make another hole, using just their back flippers that work like shovels. The second hold is more than a foot deep and is where they lay their eggs. Afterwards they bury the eggs and then fill the big whole back up and then camoflauge it. They spend well over an hour on this process.

Both of the mama turtles we watched worked so long and so hard but weren't able to lay their eggs. The first one hit a rock when she was digging the second hole, so she abandoned and went back to the ocean. The second one hit a root, so she moved about 10 feet over and started all over again. These turtles are nearly extinct and the volunteers there are doing everything they can to help them. Sometimes the spot the turtle chooses to nest has such dry sand that 90% of what they dig up falls back in, so volunteers help them remove the sand -- discretely and quietly. So I didn't get to see any eggs being laid or baby turtles scurrying to the ocean, but what I did see was incredilbe. They lay 80 - 200 eggs, several times in a season, but less than 1% of all the eggs they lay result in a surviving turtle. 

 baby

 Hatchlings making their way to the ocean

Mama

I feel very drawn to the idea of volunteering with the conservation group. It was a remarkable experience and I think it would very interesting and rewarding to volunteer. Have to look into it further. 

Ryan's babysitting experience was a great success! It was just what she needed. She really had fun and so did the kids. She swam with them, walked with them, and she read to them for more than an hour. She said to me afterwards, "Mom, I know for sure that I want to have kids."