Sargasso Sea Weed

[El Graduado]

even if there is no change in the nests it may be a problem for the hatchlings to navigate through the sargasso on the beach.

I decided to go look again at the east side with an eye out as to whether or not the seaweed was any impediment to the turtles laying eggs there. Below are some photos of the beach between Punta Morena and Chumul (that is the name of the hill that Coconuts and Ventanas al Mar occupy).

You can see in the photograph #1 and #2 that there is a lot of Sargasso, but you can also see in the enlarged portion of the image #2 that there are also a LOT of new turtle nests. Each red stick marks one nest. There are dozens in the enlarged portion image and several hundred in the large original image .





Next, we talked to the night watchmen at Ventanas al Mar Hotel. They said there were between five and ten turtles every night laying eggs within view of the hotel’s restaurant balcony. We decided to see for ourselves.

Last night, around 9PM, the turtles started coming up on the beach to lay eggs. They seemed to have absolutely no trouble at all with the Sargasso. In fact, it looked to me that that was the easiest part for them; imagine hauling a full ice chest across the sand of a beach. Now imagine dragging that same ice chest across a grassy lawn. That is what it looked like. They could get a grip with their flippers in the Sargasso, the slide across it with no problem. When they scuttled across the sand, their flippers often lost grip and flung sand up in the air.



We asked the watchmen about the hatchlings. They said they have been hatching out every evening fairly early, and make it to the water with no problem. A few get disorientated right out of the hole for some reason and head towards the dunes before turning around and then making it to the sea. A couple of these goofy ones end up in the swimming pool for the night, before the groundkeeper nets them out in the morning and sends them on their way.

Anyway, it seems to me that the turtles (large or small) are not too much bothered by the Sargasso. The newest studies that found out where the new turtle hatchlings spend their “lost years” say it is in the Sargasso Sea. Apparently, the temperature there is around three to four degrees higher in the floating Sargasso, so the small, cold-blooded turtle’s metabolism is revved up by the added warmth and they grow faster in that food-rich environment. So I guess they maybe have some sort of genetic predisposition to finding that sort of floating Sargasso in the mid-Atlantic, and if they do, perhaps Sargasso does not look so much like a barrier to them, but rather something vaguely familiar in their little turtle brains!

 

[ColoDale]

By your photos, the Sargasso in North Akumal in late June was much thicker and turtles were coming up on the beach. Daily there were new white markers. It was a pain for us to get through but I wasn't on my belly.

 

[JFS]

The problem will be with the baby turtles struggling to get over the sargasso to the ocean. It may take them hrs in some locations and predators will have an easier time getting them. I tried some sargasso today on the surface after a dive....it was crunchy.

 

[El Graduado]

The problem will be with the baby turtles struggling to get over the sargasso to the ocean.

That was the one of the misconceptions I was addressing in my post. As I said in it, the baby turtles did not seem to have any trouble at all climbing on and over the Sargasso on the beach.

 

[cvchief]

From Por Esto with Google's help: Sargazo on the west coast COZUMEL, 15 August.- While cleaning efforts are concentrated kelp in the eastern part of the island; dockside San Miguel gradually take over portions with this sea vegetable, and providers of water services think I could have consequences as in January this year when at least 170 tonnes of this herb covered a large part of the right side of the pier. Begins to gradually appear kelp near the pier San Miguel, just on the right side where the various providers of tourist services snorkel or glass bottom boats and dive some make up their boats to tourists who purchase their travel companies. Patches of kelp have been saturating toward the front of the island, and is now on a part of the little sand on that side, to another, but as much at the mercy of the waves covering several square meters of mirror water and below the passenger pier. It has not established any strategy by municipal authorities to remove the kelp begins to arrive near the boardwalk, and according to some brokers that sell boat trips to tourists, should have a plan to address this situation and prevent re-cover a large expanse of this beach as earlier this year when even fetid smells evolved. Is that for now the efforts of the temporary employment program focused primarily on the withdrawal of the tons of vegetable public beaches across the island in an area of ​​at least seven kilometers affected lot with the algae. In January this year, were removed from the same part of the pier San Miguel, about 170 tons of kelp, for which I had to use heavy machinery whose shovel placed the marine material of tippers carrying him to his final destination a land where compost serve.

 

[mstevens]

Then there's this: Riviera Maya News » Turtles found dead from machines removing sargasso

Even if the adults and hatchlings can clamber over the sargassum, you can always just smish them with a tractor to make the beach nicer for your hotel guests.