Featured Seawords Article March 2019

Volunteer with Hawaiian green sea turtleA Day in the Life of a Sea Turtle Camper on East Island

Lindsey Bull, UHM MOP Student Staff

Imagine waking up in a tent hearing the waves crash, the screams of countless nesting seabirds, and the sound of monk seal pups vocalizing at their moms. You begin to feel the heat from the sun, and you get up and unzip your tent door to realize you are on East Island at French Frigate Shoals.

The Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument is home to an abundant number of animals that call the Hawaiian Islands their home. Given the opportunity, some of us more fortunate scientists get to call this amazing place our home during the summer. Each year the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) deploys small field teams to various atolls throughout the Monument. Scientists studying the endemic Hawaiian monk seal (Monachus schauinslandi) are set-up at French Frigate Shoals, Laysan Island, Lisianski Island, Pearl and Hermes Reef, and Kure Atoll. Scientists studying Hawaiian green sea turtles (Chelonia mydas) like myself are stationed at French Frigate Shoals (FFS), where we camp on East Island and Tern Island. FFS consists of eight sandy islands: Shark, Tern, Trig, Round, East, Gin, Little Gin, Disappearing and a single rocky pinnacle called La Perouse. However, more than half of the turtle nesting for the season occurs on East Island.

The sea turtle team for 2018 was comprised of myself, Lindsey Bull, Marylou and Jan-Willem Staman. Marylou and Jan-Willem were returning for their second season at FFS and after spending a season out here, I understand why they were eager to come back. We work on a rotation of two scientists spending two weeks on East Island and one scientist spending one week on Tern Island. We only have one scientist on Tern Island at a time because there are not as many nesting sea turtles on Tern like there are on East.

East Island is only about 2000 feet long and 400 feet wide. That is about six football fields long and a little over one football field wide. This is what we called home from mid-April to early October. When you look at satellite images this island appears to be a “sandbar,” but once we arrived we observed it was so much more. This island consisted of many species of plants, nesting seabirds, endemic Hawaiian monk seals and of course Hawaiian green sea turtles. The water surrounding the island is shades of teal and blue that you would not believe, and home to foraging eagle rays (Aetobatus narinari) and huge patrolling tiger (Galeocerdo cuvier) and Galapagos sharks (Carcharhinus galapagensis) preying on disoriented albatross (Phoebastria immutabilis) fledglings and newly pupped monk seals playing in the waves. Having this scenery as our front yard made East Island seem like a dream paradise.

I bet you are wondering what a day at field camp consists of. Since sea turtles nest at night, there were some major adjustments to our sleeping schedule to make sure we would be able to stay up the entire night into the next morning. However, just like we see in the main Hawaiian Islands, the sea turtles also bask on the beaches during the day time. Our work day generally started around 4pm, when we would walk around the island to survey the basking turtles. During our afternoon surveys we would lightly engrave and use non-toxic white paint to mark numbers on the turtles’ shells so that we could walk around and record which turtles were basking without disturbing them the next time. Then, if any of the turtles needed DNA samples, tags, or measurements we would take care of that, too. Once we had those data, we did not have to disturb the turtles again and we used it to estimate the nesting population for the season. When our daytime work was complete, we began to prepare for the night survey. In the beginning of the season we started our nightly surveys at 9 pm, but later on in the season when the hatchlings were starting to emerge we shifted gears and began surveying just around sunset at 7 pm, which is peak hatching time.

Walking around a small relatively deserted island in the middle of the night might sound kind of scary but to my surprise it was very peaceful. However, I did have to make sure to keep an eye out for countless obstacles such as sleeping monk seals – especially mom and pup pairs – and of course the dozens of nesting female sea turtles. Most nights we used red light-emitting headlamps, but when there was a full moon it was so bright there was no need for any extra light. My favorite part about working all night was when I had found a female that was in the final stages of preparing her nest for eggs and I could sit on the berm and lean on my backpack and stare up at the sky. I was amazed at the number of stars I could see and how the Milky Way lit up the whole sky. Most people would think that the challenge of our job is staying up all night. However, when we walk our final lap just around first light we try and get ready for bed as fast as we can because the real challenge is falling asleep. Once the sun was up, the temperature in our tents would skyrocket and then adding on the lovely screams of the birds made it extremely hard to sleep. If we got more then 3-4 hours of sleep in a row, it was a miracle. We usually call our field season, a summer of napping.

The experiences I gained from my time in the field are ones that only a few places can offer. The memories will last a lifetime, and the new skills and knowledge I gained have helped point me toward a career. Some people would be scared of the idea that they have no cell phone, internet, running water or a room with walls, however, I am already looking forward to when I get to go back.