The cute, tiny sea turtle hatchlings crawling out of their sandy nests in droves, each the size of a silver dollar, flailing little flippers like crazy to reach the relative safety of the ocean, that endears so many people to the loggerheads and green turtles that hatch on Southwest Florida beaches.
But a whole bunch of the little ones don't make it.
David Godfrey, director of the Sea Turtle Conservancy, said more than 100,000 hatchlings don’t make it annually. A more precise number, he said, is rather impossible.
In many cases, hatchlings paddle like crazy but go the wrong way. Away from the water. Drawn by the lights of the beachfront towns on the opposite side of the beach than the Gulf.
They run out of steam never realizing they were headed the wrong direction. Dozens are found dead the next morning, strewn about the beach far from the water line. Or worse, squashed by cars as they tried to cross the paved road that runs along the shoreline of many beach towns.
When hatchlings go the wrong way, it's — almost kindly — called a "disorientation."
But the fact is, nearly every time they perish headed in the wrong direction, it's a preventable death.
Nowhere in Southwest Florida do hatchlings crawl the wrong way, often to their demise, than at Fort Myers Beach. Even town officials admit it, and say they are working hard for that to change.
"The recent spate of hurricanes, Hurricane Ian, Idalia, Milton, Helene, they took their toll on the trees, knocked down a lot of structures," Chadd Chustz, a Fort Myers beach environmental manager who oversees sea turtle issues, said. "And as a consequence, our beaches are a lot more exposed to light. And that light pollution poses a problem to sea turtles that orient themselves with the moon and starlight reflecting off the Gulf. Whenever they are misoriented, they go the wrong direction and suffer as a consequence."
Sea turtle eggs incubate for two months before all of the hatchlings dig out of the nest at once, which can take several days.
The Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission reports that as a group, hatchlings usually wait until nighttime and all dash for the water at once. Hatchlings die of dehydration if they don't make it to the ocean fast enough. Birds, crabs, and other predators also zero-in on the young turtles.
If they make it into the water and live, that process "imprints" their home beach into the hatchlings, which is what causes the females, when grown, to return to lay nests on the same beach.
Only about one in 1,000 sea turtles survive to adulthood.
Most beach towns in Southwest Florida have sea turtle ordinances, and a main focus of them is preventing disorientations. Fort Myers Beach can levy fines on beachfront home and business owners — $250 for a first offense and $500 for a repeat.
Chustz, from Fort Myers Beach, said he talks to the light polluters first, and 90% of the time, everything is resolved right then and there.
"The sea turtle ordinance does apply to all properties on the beach, so you don't necessarily have to be beachfront," Chustz said. "We just want to let people know how to come into compliance, what the issues are. Education is a real big component. Educate, educate, educate. I don't like paperwork, and people don't usually like whenever they get paperwork from me.”
Nesting season in Southwest Florida runs officially from May 1 through Oct. 31, though sea turtles don't carry calendars. Mama turtles sometimes show up earlier, and some clutches of eggs incubate into November.
“If you have any questions or concerns,” Chustz said. “Just give me a call and we'll point you in the right direction."
Chustz can be reached at (239) 462-8127.
Environmental reporting for WGCU is funded in part by VoLo Foundation, a nonprofit with a mission to accelerate change and global impact by supporting science-based climate solutions, enhancing education, and improving health.
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