It has been a busy week for the counters and taggers of Indian Cove! We began our third survey session on May 25th. We didn't see any crabs during the day but that night they were everywhere. The water was murky, with zero visibility, but we could feel the crabs with our feet as we walked through the water, surveying the beach. We would then reach into the water to touch the crabs to determine whether they were singles or pairs. We even found females who had two mates. It was like a treasure hunt and everyone was pretty excited. We counted a grand total of 89 crabs! We also tagged 13 crabs, which doesn't seem like very many but we have a rule that we don't disturb any pairs which are buried in the sand. That's an indication that they are busy laying and fertilizing their eggs. We found 4 crabs which had been previously tagged elsewhere. We call these recaptures. It's a very important part of the study to report any recaptures. It gives the researchers information about where the crab has been and about it's condition and longevity. If you find a crab with a tag you should call the phone number on the tag and report the tag i.d. number, the date , and the location where you found it.
On Thursday morning, May 27th, we again found no crabs. On Thursday night I was all set to head out with the group when I received a request from Menunkatuck to join fellow board members, Shannon Schiesser and Jim Murtaugh for a filming of Scott Tucker's cable access program, Expedition New England. My husband, Vaughn, said he would fill in for me at the Cove survey, so I met the others at Circle Beach in Madison at 11:45 p.m. I met Scott, his daughter Daphne, his friend Ron, and Ron's son Jerome. We found plenty of crabs, tagged a few, had fun looking for them, and enjoyed an absolutely gorgeous full moon. I'll let you know when the show is supposed to air. The Indian Cove group did beautifully without me, counting 28 crabs, tagging 16, and recording 1 recapture.
Saturday, May 29th was the final day of the full moon session. Still no crabs during the day. They really do like the nighttime better and who can blame them; a quiet beach, moonlight reflecting on the water, it's pretty romantic! We had a large group on Sat. afternoon, including a number of kids, which was great. We were sad to find a dead female crab but she did make it possible for us to have tagging practice. Everyone who wanted to try tagging a crab was able to do it. All of the kids got a chance to tag and to hold her and I got to tell them all of the "cool stuff" about horseshoe crabs. That night we met at 12:40 a.m. Kudos to all of the volunteers who were able to stay awake until then! We only found 6 crabs during the survey but we tagged 26 afterwards. That's the most we've tagged at the Cove so far. There were 6 recaptures.
Some of our team members are tagging on their own as well. Jim Murtaugh and his daughter, Eryn, Lorrie Shaw,and Sue Coale have tagged over 100 crabs at Trolley Rd. beach. Melanie Tolley has tagged 25 or more at Grass Island and Ann Delaney has tagged as many at Indian Cove.
Our team has grown to over 40 members. It's a wonderful group of dedicated and interesting people. I'm delighted to see how smoothly they can now do the survey and tagging with out me. Maybe I should take a vacation....
American Kestrel
