It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like DAMN ITS COLD! 12-10-2017

We had been given the call to walk the big beach on Saturday. Then, temps and winds looked like they'd be better for us to walk Sunday, so we were asked to be at the big beach at first light on Sunday morning. We were also requested to pick up a dead Snowy Owl that was out there. Ah, the glamorous life.

We got to our destination just before first light and I made my way through the murky morning to the spot where the bird was laying. I bagged it up, brought it to the car and we suited up for the beach walk, just as the sun was breaking. Upon seeing the beach, the waves and the cold wind, we figured we were in for a big day.


It was pretty cold and windy, raining, sleeting and even some snow blew at us. Surely the turtles would need our help. I walked briskly, getting way ahead of Andrea. Though she was cursing me (she told me later), I thought it was important to get to any turtles as quickly as possible, considering the low air temps.


We weren't seeing turtles, though. It seemed right and we'd been told earlier in the week that Saturday night was going to be "a wild one". One good thing happened, though. Way up, almost to the Point, I saw some white. We got a small reward for retrieving that dead Snowy... a live one hiding up ahead.


Of course, we didn't want to scare it, being a tired long-distance traveler and all, but we had to get past where it was. We had a job to do. So, we carried on. The bird did take flight, moving closer to the Point by about 100 yards. Roughly 20 feet from where it had been hiding, this very dead Kemp's Ridley was half buried in the sand.

It had been nibbled on and was very limp so into my backpack it went as we carried on. (Bird footprints around a turtle are never a good sign...)

The Snowy wasn't bothered by our presence anymore.

#91 on the year.

At the Point, we stopped for a breather and called in the turtle that we would be bringing back. A Grey Seal kept popping up to look at us.


We had a fairly uneventful walk back, still surprised by the lack of cold-stunned turtles. Back at the Sanctuary, we learned that the "wild night" didn't materialize and that the only other turtle of the day was a live Loggerhead. We helped check in our deceased specimen... he will get necropsied later on. We can learn from everything.

Tim and Kim were there, so it was nice to talk with them. The dead Snowy was laid out (prior to freezing and taking to an Owl guy in the Blue Hills) and one of the staff there taught us all a lot about these birds. This one was probably an adult female. An interesting fact... Snowys have  one talon that is somewhat like a thumb; it can turn to go in and grasp from the side. This pic kind of shows that...


A long day but not a wasted day. IF something had come in, we'd have been there. We learned some, we exercised some and we were together (when I wasn't 300 yards ahead of Andrea...)