SEMI-RENOURISHED BEACH & "TRASHY PHOTOS"

The "renourishment" project that the county took on all by itself, because the federal and state governments reneged on their obligation to pay for beach renourishment throughout the state this year, is completed and appears to have salvaged at least about 1700' of the beach running south of the jetty. While the renourishment has saved a good part of the city beach property and some private property immediately south of the jetty, it stopped too short to save any of the rest of the mile or so of beach and beach dune grasses running south beyond that portion that was renourished. To date, this Turtle Dad has not seen any nests since the beginning of the sea turtle nesting season (March/April) on any part of the entire beach running for a approximately one mile immediately south of the jetty. It appears that it will be a very sparse year for turtle nesting and hatching on our section of the south beach area.

Further south of the 1700 ' of beach that was just renourished, is the remainder of a mile or so of beach that has been severely eroded, to the extent that there are still some very steep "escarpments" on that portion of beach that will continue to obstruct sea turtles from advancing far enough onshore to lay their eggs. Many of these escarpments have been leveled somewhat, so there is still some hope that, eventually, some sea turtles will be able to crawl up on the beach far enough over the escarpments to actually dig their nests and lay their eggs. So far, the score is zero!

The good news is that there appears to be other people that walk the beach, in addition to this Turtle Dad, who are helping to keep the beach somewhat free of "litter". I know that you are expecting to see some photos of sea turtles and nests when you read this blog, but all I have to offer this time are some photos of the "semi-renourished" beach and some "trashy photos" showing that there are still some concientious beach walkers who try to keep the beach and surrounding environment "cleaned-up" after some less-than conscientious beach goers have left their trash on the public beaches. Thanks to those that are "pitching-in" to help keep the beaches litter-free!