Park 49 - My turtle mama's nest

Nest: Park 49
Location: 3 5/8
Date: Aug. 26
Observers: Gigi, Borja, Bjorn
Rf: 122212 lf:122213
Measuemrents:
Egg count: 160

This is my mama turtle, the one who laid 160 eggs on my hand and behaved spectacularly well during the entire measuring and marking process during my last midnight patrol.

Went out for our first patrol without Emma or Cata, and wo better to go with than the sloth savior Bjorn, and my spanish compa Borja. 12-4am shift is also sensa tourists, sppotters, and guides. (but not poachers nor jags). Night started discouragingly slow, identifying a limited amount of only full pairs of tracks, meaning oly about 60 turtles on our 3 mile stretch wo had already gone thru the motions.

We reach our patroling limit at mile 5, also then limit to the public acces to the national park. On this final 1/8 of a mile, there are 3 freshly killed turtle mamas. 2 by jags (u can tell by the jugular attack, the emptying out of its insides -sometimes pieces of vertabrae are beside it- and its flippers still intact) and 1 by poacher (giveaway is missing flippers). All three carrying a fowl pertified smell- which when we reached, Borja and I simultaneously suggested to head back, not wanting to be mistaken for the jaguar's next snack.

Lucky we did so, because we spotted a track that led to this maginificent mama, that we were ale to work with from oviposition stage to camou (the whole thing, about 8-10 steps) all o ournown. And we did so in a professional, calm, and nondisturbing manner. I was so proud ofour team, and so honored that then turtle allowed (possibly unknowingly) me to be part of her labour.

We waited patientky for about 15 minutes as she prepped egga chamber, out of her eye preceptn (?), then i put on my glove on thenright, clicker on thenleft, and began crawling towrds her. Dug my arm tunnel to reach into the egg chamber and under her shell & cloaca, marked my elbow spot for mynleft to then handle the measuring tape and flag the nest. And waited an additional 5-7 min for her to perfect her egg chamber. Being thisnclose to her, seeing her oush up and carefully dig out withing a foot distance, was INCREDiBLE and so intimate. Then i sensed pulsations start, digging persits, and her baclknflpper situate like seal's flippers do, tightly together. Thats thensign. Takes a bit of more digging on my part to go past her new barrier... And the counter clicking begins, as i feel this golf size balls are gentky released in sets of 2-4 in my hand then egg chamber.

All is safe now, once she starts, we cannot (or highly unusual) scare her off, so incall my mates and they hand me the measuring tape on my clicker hand. Mark flags and high tide line under our given oviposition stage, my hand getting closer andncloser to her body and she fills up the nest to its top! And i begin to feel a slower rhythm, time to wrap up and set up for tagging a measuring.... Wile she closes the eggchamber nonaggresively and still in trance mode. Check check check, measurments.... 107.3 m i believe. And we send her off to the ocean.

Walked back to center, or rather floated. Still on cloud nine.

Now in 30min starting my 8-12am patrol, w tourists and all. And then 6-10 am patrol. More stories to come!