Hurricane Irene’s rough surf caused problems for sea turtle nests in Florida.
The eggs of Loggerhead, Leatherback, and green turtles are normally burrowed in the sand. But the erosion has been strong enough to expose them.
Many of the eggs were left damaged, while some sea turtles were hatching prematurely.
Turtle hatchlings that shouldn’t have been born yet are fighting the rough surf. Biologists from Loggerhead Marine Life Center are combing beaches on the East Coast to try to save the turtles. But there wasn’t much that could have been done to prevent the problem.
The marine center’s Biologists crunched the numbers and found that roughly 88% of the remaining nests this season were tossed around by Irene’s rough waters. That means about 700 of the active 2200 nests in Juno & Jupiter beaches were lost completely.
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