Park Chief Haritchai Rittichuay reported that officers yesterday (July 26) had found leatherback turtle tracks on the beach about two kilometers south of Khao Nayak, where a turtle nest was found earlier this month.
Officers followed the tracks and found the nest some 90 centimeters deep in the sand.
After confirming that turtle eggs had been laid, the officers covered the nest back up and built a protective enclosure around it to protect it from predators, Park Chief Haritchai added.
“To let the eggs hatch naturally, officers will not move the eggs,” he said.
A leatherback turtle nest was found on the beach in front of Khao Nayak, the “resident reef” at Khao Lak, on July 7. That nest contained nearly 100 fertilised eggs that are expected to produce younglings.
Just one week earlier, a nest of leatherback turtle eggs were found on Thai Mueang Beach, north of Phuket, which was believed to have been laid by the same turtle that came ashore at Mai Khao Beach just days earlier.