The Turtle Experience
Added to website: 27 July 2007
Tobago
The Turtle Experience
On the evening of Thursday 19th July, I was one of a group of CCC volunteers carrying out the last turtle watch of the season. Turtle watch involved walking up and down a very long beach several times after dark, to look for nesting mothers or hatchlings, and to ensure they remain safe should we see them.
We arrived on the beach, and so far there was no sign of any adult Leatherback turtles, which are difficult to miss as they grow as big as two metres. We began to walk up and down the beach, which had huge, bright lights positioned at both ends. We later learned of the risk these lights posed to the turtles, as they follow the light of the moon as guidance to and from the sea, and these lights could confuse and disorientate them.
After our second fruitless lap of the beach, we had a long break on the sun loungers of the hotel. However, once we resumed walking, it became apparent that out luck had changed. A small crowd of people were crowded around a patch of sand at the top of the beach. We rushed forward, expecting to see a huge, egg laying Leatherback any second, until a tiny shape flopped on the sand in front of us. It was a baby Leatherback turtle; about 10 cm long, scuttling across the beach towards the sea. We all stopped and stared in astonishment as another two followed it. We had stumbled across a nest of hatching baby turtles. Gian instantly ran up the beach to guard the nest, and began to excavate its contents, looking for eggshells, unhatched eggs and hatchlings that had been unable to get out-also known as stragglers.
The eggshells and unhatched eggs were about the size of ping pong balls, but did not have a hard, rigid shell like a bird’s egg; it was more like rubber. Scrabbling around inside the nest, Gian eventually found our first straggler that had gotten lodged in the sand, and several more of these weak hatchlings followed. He told us to hold and stroke them to keep them warm and get their muscles working. Once they were struggling to escape our grasp, we were told to take them closer to the shore to let them struggle the last few feet of sand to the sea. It was important not to release them directly into the sea; they had to be allowed to “taste” the sand first, to know what to look for when it was eventually time for them to return to land.
Unfortunately, as we released them, several of the hatchlings changed direction and began to head for the lights at the other end of the beach, illustrating the danger these lights create for the turtles. We tried several ways of redirecting them, including standing in front of the lights to block them, digging channels for the hatchlings directly to the sea, and even shining a mobile phone directly in front of them to lead them into the sea.
Eventually our efforts paid off, and we guided all twelve stragglers into the sea. Gian did discover two premature hatchlings which were still absorbing the yolk of their eggs, ad those were taken back to the volunteer centre to finish absorbing it before being released. There were plenty of eggs that had not been fertilised, or had simply not hatched. Even the turtles that did make it into the sea had a one-in-a-thousand chance of surviving into adulthood, so it is easy to see why the numbers of wild turtles left are worryingly low.
Despite knowing the odds against them, we left the beach very happy late that evening, knowing that we had helped save the lives of a dozen critically endangered animals which may not even have lived to see outside of their nest. It was certainly one of the most extraordinary experiences of my life, and a striking and satisfying reminder of what conservation volunteers can achieve.
Eleanor Beevor
