Kiawah Conversations: Loggerhead Turtles

The Town is pleased to announce the first in a new series of educational programs called KIAWAH CONVERSATIONS that focus on Kiawah’s unique resiliency, sustainability and environmental issues. Programs will be scheduled on Thursday afternoons at 3:00 p.m. at Town Hall, but only when Our World programs are not scheduled at the Sandcastle.

Our inaugural Kiawah Conversations -- “Kiawah's Loggerhead Turtles: Genetic Tagging of Ancient Mariners” -- will take place on Thursday, Jan. 29 at 3:00 p.m. Our speaker is Dr. Brian Shamblin from the Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources at the University of Georgia.

Dr. Shamblin and his team have been collaborating with sea turtle patrols, including our Turtle Patrol here on Kiawah to “genetically tag” nesting loggerheads north of Florida since 2006 through nest samples. They have identified over 16,000 nesting females via genetic information from a single egg from each nest.

Recently, Dr. Shamblin has developed a novel technique to identify breeding males via sperm trapped in the egg yolk membrane, allowing a non-invasive population count of adult sea turtles via land. He will discuss how the genetic tagging has informed loggerhead turtle recovery and continues to address questions of conservation concern, with a focus on South Carolina and Kiawah Island turtles.

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Host or Publisher Madeleine Kaye