Boca Raton's five miles of beach have produced the best sea turtle nesting season the city has ever counted for two of its three species. The tally kept by the Gumbo Limbo Nature Center's sea turtle team stands at 1,118 loggerhead nests and 43 leatherback nests for 2026, and the city has marked both numbers as record highs for Boca.

How big the jump is

The city publishes every season's totals going back to 1988 on its nesting numbers page, and lined up against that history, this year stands out. The best loggerhead year before this one was 1990, with 1,075 nests. The closest any recent season came was 2023, at 1,038. Last year the count was 819, which means roughly 300 more loggerhead nests were dug into Boca sand this summer than last.

The leatherback number is the more startling one. Leatherbacks are the giants of the group, and they have always been rare visitors here: three nests in 1988, single digits through much of the 1990s, and a previous high of 33 back in 2012. Last season Boca recorded 21. This season it has 43, a little more than double, and about fourteen times what the beach saw when the city started keeping count.

Green turtles are the one species that did not set a mark. The 2026 count is 154, below last year's 243. Greens are the wild card in Boca's records, swinging from 19 nests in 2018 to 393 the following year, so a quieter green year sits comfortably within their usual pattern. Add all three species together and the 2026 total comes to 1,315 nests, the third best season on the books behind 2023 and 2019.

Who does the counting

None of these numbers are estimates. From March 1 through October 31, Boca Raton's Sea Turtle Conservation team walks the city's beaches at sunrise every morning, looking for the tracks left overnight. According to the city's description of the program, every nest and every false crawl (a turtle that came ashore but went back without laying) is logged by GPS. New nests get stakes and a sign. Nests laid too close to the high tide line can be moved, and some get screens to keep foxes and raccoons out.

The work does not stop at the count. Nests hatch roughly two months after they are laid, usually at night. Three days later the team excavates each one and records what is inside, data that feeds into statewide population monitoring. Any live hatchlings still in the nest go back to Gumbo Limbo and are released on the beach after dark.

That is why the record carries weight. It is a nest by nest count, built from the same daily survey on the same stretch of coast, so a jump like this one reflects what actually happened on the sand rather than a change in how anyone counted.

The season is not quite over

Nesting season on Florida's east coast officially runs through the end of October, so the 2026 figures on the city's page can still tick up before the books close. Any late additions can only push the two records higher, since both already sit above every earlier season the city has counted.

Where to see the turtles now

The summer programs that put residents on the beach with a nesting loggerhead or a handful of hatchlings are finished for the year. The Turtle Walks and Hatchling Releases ran from late May through August and sold out for the entire 2026 season. Reservations for both opened in April and May this year, with city and beach district residents getting a head start of about a week on everyone else. If you missed out this summer, that spring window is the one to watch next year.

In the meantime, Gumbo Limbo Nature Center at 1801 N. Ocean Blvd. keeps resident sea turtles in its large outdoor marine aquariums, alongside native fish and other marine animals. The 20 acre preserve on the barrier island also has a boardwalk through coastal forest, a butterfly garden and Jacob's Outlook, a 40 foot observation tower reached by an accessible ramp. The nature center and aquariums are open 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday and from noon on Mondays, while the boardwalk, trail and tower stay open daily from 7 a.m. to sunset.

For something different, the center runs After Hours Tours, with the next one on Friday, Oct. 16, from 6 to 7:30 p.m. The walk covers the butterfly garden, the Ashley Nature Trail and the outdoor aquariums under lights, timed for sunset over the Intracoastal. It costs $10 for Boca Raton residents and $13 for everyone else, it is open to adults and children 7 and up, and reservations are required through the city's online registration system.

What it means if you live here

A record nesting year is a reminder that the beach at the end of your street is, for eight months of the year, a nursery. More nests means more stakes and signs along the dunes, more hatchlings heading for the water, and more reasons to keep beach lights off and holes filled in. It also means the people who walk Boca's sand at dawn every morning have just written the best chapter in nearly four decades of records, and that the leatherbacks, once a rarity here, are showing up in numbers nobody in the city has seen before.