Wednesday’s Venice Gondolier featured a report on an experiment by a volunteer beach patrol to deter predation of endangered sea-turtle eggs by coyotes and armadillos.  With the blessing of Florida’s Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC), they sprinkled varying amounts of Carolina Reaper pepper (one of the hottest known to humanity) atop four beach-nests over a range of time (with a nearby one being the control–no deterrent):

1. 2 tablespoons (tbsp) every 5 days
2. 4 tbsp every 5 days
3. 2 tbsp every 10 days
4. 4 tbsp every 10 days

This forms a full, two-level factorial.  That is good thinking.  However, they would have done well to replicate it to provide some statistical power for not only the main effects of amount and time-spacing, but also the possible interaction of these factors (maybe a particular combination works best).  In any case, these innovative volunteers discovered that the hot pepper kept the coyotes away, but, unfortunately not the armadillos, who quickly learned how to dig under the deterrent and get at the eggs.  On the brighter side, the pepper put off an inundation of fire ants—to the great relief of the experimenters going in to inspect the nests.

The FWC is now reviewing these findings to consider modifying the advice they laid out in this 2010 Sea Turtle Nest Predator Control Plan, which focuses only on raccoons and ghost crabs.  The Floridian authorities do not go gentle into the night: They trap and/or shoot to kill the cravenly critters.

PS: I’ve never seen a sea turtle, but landlocked terrapins abound in the Venice area, where my wife and I winter.  Earlier this month I overheard some tourists discussing what to do with a Gopher tortoise (like the one pictured below) under a beach-way boardwalk—put it directly back in the ocean or just leave by the edge.  Luckily for the tortoise they finally decided to let it be, ha ha.