Sea Turtle Biology & Conservation Eighth Annual Workshop (1988)

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TURTLE ACTIVITY
(EAST BEACH)
HOUR OF TIDAL CYCL,E
TURTLE ACTIVITY
(SOUTH BEACH)
P;
W
12.0 @FLS CRAVLS
P7
NESTS
9.6
5; 7.2
z,
4
* w
4.8
2.4
4pc
P;v
W
0.0
>
-3-2-1 H 1 2 3 4 5 L -5-4
4,
HOUR OF TIDAL CYCLE
Figure 1. Emergence activity on Bald Head Island as related to the tidal cycle.
analyses and they viola~te the assumption of mutual independence, only nonparametric statistics
(Sign Test, P < 0.10:1 were used to test the hypothesis that tidal stage had no effect on emergence
activity.
Figure 1 shows the percentages of the activity type for each beach (South Beach: False Crawls
= 45, Nests = 54; East Beach: False Crawls = 35, Nests = 41). There was no significant difference
in nesting false crawls in relation to the tidal cycle on South Beach, but there was a
distinct pattern in tlie ~clistribution of nests and a significant pattern in the distribution of false
crawls in relation to the tidal cycle on East Beach, with the peak of activities occurring around
high tide (Figure 2)