The Department of Environment turtle team is assessing the impact of Hurricane Ian on local turtle nests along the shoreline after associated sea surges battered the coastline.
Ian, a Category 1 hurricane as it passed Grand Cayman, left behind downed lines and trees, along with flooding, as it brushed the Cayman Islands.
On Tuesday British Royal Navy personnel joined in post-Ian clean-up here in the Cayman Islands.
The DoE said in preparation for Hurricane Ian, the turtle team carried out 37 turtle nest excavations and 14 nest relocations, rescuing more than 1,000 sea turtle hatchlings that were due to hatch during the storm.
“When hatchlings hatch from their eggs, they take a few days to climb to the surface of the sand. If the nest is washed over by waves during this time, they will become trapped and drown. By removing these hatchlings early, we were able to release them to sea while their bodies were strongest for swimming offshore before the storm arrived,” the DoE said in a post on its Facebook page.
Turtle researcher Jane Hardwick and team have been assessing the impact of the storm on nests on all three islands.
“We don’t know the full impact yet, we have more than 200 nests to check. So far we have found most nests have been at least washed over. When they get washed over it doesn’t necessarily mean they won’t survive, but we have to wait and see how many hatch, so we don’t know the full impact until all have hatched (or not hatched),” she told the Cayman Compass Wednesday morning in a message.
Last year, storms affecting Cayman resulted in the loss of just over a quarter of the turtle nests tagged on local beaches, according to Department of Environment figures.
In total, 141 nests (26.5%) were washed over by waves.
Of those, the DoE said, 88 nests still hatched, although 26 suffered reduced hatch success and 21 failed.
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