Hatchlings at Turtle Cove

Step Creek used to have a lot more greenery before. Much of the water used to be hidden by branches and leaves. I called it Turtle Cove because baby turtles swam there, safe from the sight of predators. I found the place rather by accident.

At the edge of the water, I saw what looked like a bit of sand, with some small leaves fallen on the edge of it. But as I looked carefully, some of the leaves jiggled, and instead of the leaf stem, it seemed to have a pinhead. There were four other pinheads around the edge of the leaf, and they began spinning furiously as the leaf started floating away from me.

I realized it was a hatchling--a baby turtle, just born--the "leaf" was the shell, and the pinheads were the head and appendages, and it was trying to swim away from me! The "sand" was actually turtle eggs!

Turtle Cove was the hatchling training grounds, where adult turtles taught little ones how to dive (did you know they learn how to do that?) and swim right. Mature turtles can do things without making splashes and ripples; young ones really have to work at it. At the right season, you can walk around the park and spot places where the hatchlings are practicing, because the water's surface shows funny splashes.

After awhile, the splashes disappear. I guess that's when the mature turtles would tell the young 'uns they "passed."

Mature turtles know how to swim underwater without making a bit of a ripple at the top, so you can't detect its movement from above. Hatchlings practice this too.

Hatchlings listen to their elders absolutely, pretty unlike humans, probably because they realize their very lives are dependent on how well they learn what they're taught. Even if they do it exactly right, they may never live to adulthood.

I wonder if we would listen more absolutely to God if we could see how the predator of our souls stalks about like a roaring lion, and our survival would depend on how well we learned what we'd been taught?