Graduate student studies sea turtle
Playing with loggerhead sea turtles, living on a pristine and remote research island for the summer, and conducting valuable conservation research—this sounds like a dream to some biology students , but for biology graduate student, Catherine McCurdy, it has become a reality.
This summer, McCurdy conducted her graduate school thesis research while working for the Sea Turtle Program on St. Catherines Island, Ga., which is located in the same chain of islands that includes Tybee Island, Cumberland Island, and St. Simons Island. These locations are common nesting places for loggerhead sea turtles (Caretta caretta), because of the proximity to the open waters of the Atlantic Ocean.
According to the World Wildlife Fund, loggerhead sea turtles are among the biggest marine turtles weighing up to 400 pounds, and are currently considered an endangered species.
Rather than actually “playing” with loggerhead sea turtles, McCurdy’s research had her monitoring the progress of nests, called clutches, that turtles had buried along the sand dunes of the beach. She spent many of her summer days patrolling beaches on foot or in a John Deer gator looking for new sea turtle clutches, stranded sea turtles, or evidence that juvenile sea turtles had hatched out of a nest to make their instinctual trek into the open ocean. Sometimes, when necessary, entire nests are moved so that they are located in a more ideal location which is perhaps safer or has easier access to the ocean for when the hatchlings emerge from the nest. Some hatchlings never made it out of the nest with their hundred or so siblings, so McCurdy also became an aid in getting those few stragglers out to sea. Statistically, the odds are against the survival of young sea turtles. According to McCurdy, “the egg and hatchling stages have the lowest survivorship rates of any of the life stages of a sea turtle.”
There is no concrete evidence, but it has been suggested that only one in 500 hatchlings off the Georgia coast actually survive into adulthood. They could use all the help they can get, whether from scientists or the average person turned conservationist.
Specifically, McCurdy was looking at how sex is determined among developing sea turtle embryos in the nest. According to McCurdy. It is now known that sea turtles exhibit “temperature-dependent sex determination,” meaning that gender and the temperature of the immediate environment in and around the nest are directly related.
“The purpose of my research was to determine whether or not we’re skewing the sex ratios of hatchlings by relocating nests. There could be ecological implications for making too many males or females. Since sex is determined by environmental temperature, the different thermal characteristics of different portions of the beach could inadvertently create a sex bias,” said McCurdy.
This is important for the conservation of these animals because of how male to female ratios turn out over time. Obviously a good balance is needed for successful reproduction rates so that the turtles do not become even more endangered than they already are.
When she was not monitoring and saving turtles during the summer, McCurdy kept busy doing other notable work like assisting with management and education of Georgia public school teachers participating in a federally funded teacher quality program, and speaking at an international veterinary wildlife training program. She even received a $5200 grant from the American Museum for Natural History to help fund her thesis research to earn her graduate degree.
It seems that McCurdy has developed a lasting relationship with St. Catherines Island and the other scientists that live and work there. She plans to return to the island next summer to continue with her sea turtle research on a larger scale before beginning her Ph.D. program.
Posted by Colonnade Archives
on Nov 9 2007. Filed under Features.
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