Tyler Treadway

tyler.treadway@tcpalm.com

Federal law prohibits people from tampering with nests or touching eggs and hatchlings.

If you see eggs that have been washed out of the nest and onto the beach, don't touch them.

Call the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission hotline: 888-404-FWCC (3922).

The few Treasure Coast sea turtle nests that survived Hurricane Matthew are now being pummeled by more high tides, waves and wind.

"We've lost maybe half a dozen more nests along Hutchinson Island since the hurricane," said Niki Desjardin, senior scientist for Ecological Associates of Jensen Beach, which monitors sea turtle nests in parts of Indian River, St. Lucie and Martin counties.

The combination of the hurricane and rough seas afterward is a negative note at the end of a mostly positive sea turtle nesting season, which runs from March 1 to Oct. 31.

Because the one-two punch arrived late in the season, most nests already had hatched and most hatchlings already had scuttled into the ocean.

Loggerhead nesting is expected to set records on the Treasure Coast and throughout Florida. Loggerheads are by far the most numerous sea turtles in the state. In Indian River County, for example, a record of nearly 7,200 loggerhead nests were laid this year, said Kendra Cope, the county sea turtle coordinator. On beaches at the town of Jupiter Island, a record 7,263 loggerhead nests were counted, said town biologist Pete Quincy.

VIDEO | Scroll down to watch a video of 18 sea turtles from Jekyll Island, Georgia, be temporarily relocated to The Georgia Aquarium because of Hurricane Matthew.

Leatherbacks nest numbers are down, but that was expected because numbers had been high last year.

Green sea turtles, which also had strong nest numbers last year and were expected to be down this year, were hit hardest by Matthew because they nest later than leatherbacks and loggerheads.

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Here's a rundown:

About 600 nests, a mix of greens and loggerheads, were incubating on Indian River County beaches as Matthew arrived, Cope said, and only three marked nests were viable after the storm. That's a 99 percent hit. But because most nests already had hatched, "at most only 8 percent of the total nests of the 2016 nesting season were washed out to sea by Matthew," Cope said.

Along the northern half of Hutchinson Island, just two of 11 remaining yet-to-hatch "greenie" nests survived Matthew, said Steve T. Weege, environmental specialist for Inwater Research Group, which monitors that section of beachfront. "Those two nests are pretty high up the beach," Weege said, "so they ought to be OK."

Along the southern 10 miles of Hutchinson Island and the northern 5 miles of Jupiter island, areas monitored by Ecological Associates, 69 of 150 marked nests were lost in Matthew, 29 of them loggerhead nests, 121 green sea turtle nests. The remaining 81 were mostly green sea turtle nests, Desjardin said. Five more nests, four "greenies" and one loggerhead, washed out Tuesday from high tides and surf, she said.

Quincy at the Town of Jupiter Island counted 14 nests washed out by Matthew. Four known green sea turtle nests remain intact.

Twenty-eight of the 200 or so green sea turtle nests at Hobe Sound National Wildlife Refuge were washed out by the storm, said refuge manager Christine Trammell. Another four loggerhead nests were lost along the refuge's 3.5-mile stretch of beach in southern Martin County.

In Indian River County, Ecological Associates noted 79 green sea turtle nests were lost and 18 loggerhead nests. Only three nests remain, all greens.

Turtles

Nest losses tend to get higher as you go north because Matthew came closer to shore than it did along the Treasure Coast and because beaches are flatter up north."Reports from Brevard, Volusia and St. Johns counties are that they lost everything, all their remaining nests," Desjardin said. "Our steeper beaches help deflect the storm surge."

Turtle eggs are being reported on beaches throughout the Treasure Coast. Quincy said he saw "literally thousands" of eggs along his town's beaches. All those eggs don't represent would-be sea turtles killed by Hurricane Matthew, though.

"If you see a big clump of seaweed on the beach, it probably has some eggs in it. ... There's a whole nesting season worth of eggs that washed out in the storm," Desjardin said. "Some are viable eggs from active nests, but most are eggs that hatched or eggs that didn't hatch but were still down in the nest."

How's the water? | Map updated Sept. 30