Sea turtles lay their nests up on the beach, sometimes all the way up into the dunes. When the nests hatch, the newly hatched turtles crawl on the beach from the nest to the surf. We allow turtles from relocated nests to crawl down the beach as they would in nature. Time spent crawling on the beach is likely an essential part of the imprinting process. Imprinting is a complicated process by which the elements of the beach where sea turtles hatch - sand, water, air, and other factors - are 'programmed' into the brains of the baby turtles. Many years later, female sea turtles that may have traveled thousands of miles away return to the beaches where they hatched to lay their eggs and sustain the population. Imprinting allows this to happen.