Turtle Papparazzi

Last night I had the opportunity to watch the endangered Loggerhead Turtle do its best to propagate its species. The females only come onto shore in order to drop off eggs. They lay about 120 each time, and may lay eggs a handful of times in a season. They do not reach reproductive maturation until they are in their 30s. I wasn't able to take pictures of the actual egg laying due to disturbing the process, but these two pictures are from the mama turtle's efforts to hide the nest site.

I was part of the third group who got to watch this process that night. The park rangers didn't seem too confident after the first two groups- they even said we could hang around in the hopes of another turtle coming ashore 'if you want to' so I was feeling discouraged but I stayed the course. Lucky I stayed. A little after 10:40 my group got called. The egg laying didn't take too long but the covering of the site was done.....at a turtle's pace. Ba-da-bump. Then we watched her waddle back into the moonless ocean night.