Marine Biology - spec. Sea Turtles

Foley

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Hey you!

I'm writing a scene which is set on a beach where people monitor sea turtles and I'd like to gently pick at the brains of anyone who has experience of this kind of work - ideally sea turtles, but possibly other marine biology/preservation activities would still help. Has anyone here studied marine biology, or spent any time at one of the sea turtle sanctuaries/reservations/protected areas?
 

Foley

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Hi Jeff, thanks for stopping by.

I'm particularly interested in the daily activities of those who monitor sea turtle nesting grounds. What do they observe and record, what do the records look like (are there graphs, charts, spreadsheets... trajectories of mothers, GPS details....???), what's the daily (nightly?) schedule like... do nightime observers do anything with the turtles (I read they can be very tempermental and might go back to sea...)

Is that enough questions to start with?!? I've done quite a bit of googling, but I don't know what I don't know :)

I'm also interested in personal experiences of working at sea turtle nesting grounds or marine biology statistic gathering practices in general. Any help would be great!
 

jclarkdawe

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You might want to think of a different creature. Sea turtles were used in the book A LAST SONG, and I don't know if the movie of the same name used them. Relatively recent and as the author was Nicholas Sparks and the actress in the movie was Milley Cyrus, fairly well known.

Best of luck,

Jim Clark-Dawe
 

Foley

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Hi again Jeff, and sorry, I was in a mad dash when I saw your reply and mistook your page-link for a signature and overlooked it. There are lots of the details I was looking for there and I will probably drop them a line directly (I say probably because I hadn't heard of A Last Song...). Thanks again.

Hi Jim, that's a really helpful tipoff... and not a little frustrating! I read the synopsis and, while it's not really similar, my book does/did feature a nocturnal nest watch and a romantic liaison albeit in a more professional less adventurous capacity. Many thanks for the nod.

Mark
 

WeaselFire

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I'm also interested in personal experiences of working at sea turtle nesting grounds or marine biology statistic gathering practices in general. Any help would be great!

Drop an email to Gary Lytton, http://www.rookerybay.org/bios/Gary-Lytton.pdf. Tell him you're a writer and ask if he can put you in touch with a sea turtle monitor you could interview.

Jeff
 

Foley

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Drop an email to Gary Lytton, http://www.rookerybay.org/bios/Gary-Lytton.pdf. Tell him you're a writer and ask if he can put you in touch with a sea turtle monitor you could interview.

Jeff


Will do, Jeff. I'm going to have a look at the Sparks book and see how he dealt with the subject, but it looks like it might be quite different (a girl protecting a nest on her own vs a scientific research unit).

Cheers,
Mark
 

WeaselFire

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Not sure why having two books with a similar event is an issue. Free Willy was about a whale. Moby Dick was about a whale. Way different stories.

Jeff
 

Foley

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That's a good point. In some ways it's more to do with setting than the actual animal though. If important parts of a book were set on a 19th century whaling ship readers would possibly dismiss it as derivative of Moby Dick (one of my favourite ever books, btw). I don't think it's going to be a major problem in this case, but I do have to check the other book.

Thanks for thinking more on it! :)
 

jclarkdawe

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Not sure why having two books with a similar event is an issue. Free Willy was about a whale. Moby Dick was about a whale. Way different stories.

Jeff

But if I was writing FREE WILLY, I'd probably want to avoid naming a character "Ahab."

There might be no issue. There might be a major issue. But it's better to check sooner rather then later.

Best of luck,

Jim Clark-Dawe