Wild News: Year of the Turtle

We are familiar with the notion that the world sits on the back of a turtle, who sits on another, and so on. Like the supposed creation myth, today's Wild News is just turtles, all the way down.

So let's go.

Year of the Turtle Inspires Countries to Conserve Ancient Species

The regional Year of the Turtle campaign is being coordinated by the Secretariat of the Indian Ocean - South-East Asia (IOSEA) Marine Turtle Memorandum of Understanding which is linked to the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). The launch is conducted in collaboration with Thailand's Department of Marine and Coastal Resources.

This article from ENS gives a good idea of the diverse activities being planned by 24 countries from Australia to Iran. Yes, there are Iranians working to preserve the Hawksbill Sea Turtle.

Underwater film festivals are planned in the Seychelles to raise public awareness of the marine environment, and in Tanzania, special beach patrols and education for local communities are being organized.

While there isn't much about any of this is the American press, kossacks and kossovarians will be pleased to know that the US has in the past insisted on some protections for sea turtles in its trade arrangements. Miraculously, those protections have yet to be dismantled.

A two-member team from the United States visited the Karachi fish harbor in February to inspect measures for the conservation of endangered green turtles - a condition the US attaches to seafood imports from Pakistan.
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"Now more than 17,000 trawlers and fishing boats are registered with the Karachi Fisheries Harbour Authority that operate in the Arabian Sea," said the official. "They all have been using TEDs {Turtle Exclusion Devices} for the past more than five years and the U.S. team visit actually ensures its consistency and sometimes they ask for more measures."

The World Wildlife Fund is taking a leading role in organizing multi-nation projects:
Year of the Turtle 2006

Other WWF activities to mark the Year of the Sea Turtle include: delcaring Derawan Island, one of the the biggest green and hawksbill turtle rookeries in South-East Asia as a Marine Conservation Area; monitoring and protecting nesting sites in and around Kenya's Kiunga Marine National Reserve; satellite tagging of marine turtles in Vietnam; introducing circle hooks to tuna fleets in the Philippines to significantly reduce turtle bycatch; and establishing a joint research partnership (between Madagascar, Switzerland and France) on marine turtles in the South-West Indian Ocean.

There is considerable interest too, in Brunei and Malaysia. Year of the Turtle kicks off with call for cooperation

In Malaysia, for example, annual counts of leatherback turtle nests have dropped alarmingly from 5,000 in the 1960s to less than ten in recent years. Elsewhere, illegal turtle harvests continue to occur. Last week in Indonesia, police apprehended a fishing boat off Bali carrying 158 green turtles, most of which were safely released back into the wild.

Natural disasters, such as the Indian Ocean tsunami, have also taken a toll. A draft report discussed at the launch revealed that the tsunami had a profound impact on local communities that had been working closely with turtle conservation projects in India, Sri Lanka and Thailand.

The process of rebuilding these bonds has gradually begun.

Action Alert. SOS-Sea Turtles just launched its Bali campaign aimed squarely at the governments of Indonesia and especially of Bali, where some 3,000 sea turtles are slaughtered annually. The group is led by divers and photographers, and has the very active support of Indonesian conservation group ProFauna.

The objective of our new campaign is to collect as many signatures, statements and letters of protest as possible. We want the relevant authorities of Bali and Indonesia to be aware that people from all over the world will again focus on Bali`s sea turtles and call upon the government to stop it now forever. At the moment, Indonesia and Bali are both struggling for every single tourist. Tourism is very important for their economies, and anything that may harm their image is subsequently taken seriously. We can therefore be sure of obtaining the full attention of the authorities, although we intend to use more pressure and less diplomacy this time.

ProFauna and SOS - Sea Turtles also appeal for donations to fund this campaign and other activities, including ongoing research.

Beachfront property is, well, beachfront property. Habitat is disappearing everywhere. A significant problem in India and elsewhere is the frantic building of tourist resorts on or near nesting habitat. (An unappreciated point is the confusion that night lighting on the shore creates for the turtles.) The following is from The Nation of Bangkok. (Don't you wish Dick Armey worked there?) Turtles face extinction from nets, resorts

The marine turtle population in the Andaman Sea and the Gulf of Thailand has fallen to just 1,500, a senior official at the Natural Resources and Environment Ministry said yesterday.

The number of hawksbill, green, Ridley and leatherback turtles in the Andaman Sea and the Gulf of Thailand had fallen drastically over the past decade, said Marine and Coastal Resources Department director-general Maitree Duangsawat.

The number of leatherback turtles laying eggs on Phang Nga's Thai Muang beach and Phuket's Mai Khao beach had fallen to just a few over the past two years.

As always, Greenpeace is in the mix. It is welcomed by many locals in Orissa, who know what they are losing. Turning Turtle

The Sugayatri has just embarked on a mission to save the Olive Ridley turtle in India. The boat has been completely refitted to handle its new and very demanding job: to patrol the waters around Orissa's Gahirmatha Marine Sanctuary, documenting and observing the mass nesting of the Olive Ridley Turtle, and trying to make this nesting season a little safer for the Olive Ridley.

Unfortunately, now Orissa resembles a turtle graveyard more than a breeding ground.  The populations of the Olive Ridley are threatened by various factors like trawling, offshore drilling for oil and gas, and the proposed construction of an industrial port near the nesting sites. Over 100,000 dead Olive Ridleys have been washed ashore on the beaches of Orissa in the last decade alone.

The crew of the Sugayatri have deployed six buoys to demarcate the boundaries of the marine sanctuary. They have already seen first hand the agony of an Olive Ridley caught in a gillnet. And they have been instrumental in saving the lives of several trapped turtles. Nearby, activists have established the "Turtle Witness Camp". The camp was inaugurated with a traditional Indian ceremony, which was attended by hundreds of fisher families from neighbouring villages.

Pacific nations are joining the effort as well. The Pacific Year of the Turtle was kicked off with a new tagging project in Apia, Samoa.

And in Fiji: "Year Of The Sea Turtle" Campaign Launched In Suva

Populations of green turtles are estimated to have declined globally by around 60% over the last 50 years. Fiji is an important foraging ground for green turtles. Hence the urgent need to conserve them.

Fiji currently has a 5 year Moratorium (2004 - 2008) which bans the commercial harvest and sale of sea turtles, but the sale and consumption of turtle meat is still common.  WWF Fiji will work with partners, such as the Departments of Environment and Fisheries, to create awareness on the regulations that offer sea turtles protection within Fiji's waters.

"Turtles are a cultural icon in Fiji. It is a delicacy that is often served at important traditional functions," said Etika Rupeni, WWF Fiji Programme Country Manager. "However, with changing times, turtle meat is now a dish finding its way onto many tables. WWF believes that this is a contributing factor to the severe decline we are seeing in our turtle populations."

Practical, applied conservation yields results: In a project partially supported the US National Marine Fisheries Service, Spanish researchers have demonstrated a way to reduce turtle bycatch by as much as 80% in one fishery with two simple changes that don't reduce the catch of target species. Note the tone of cooperation with local fishermen.
Mackerel Bait Reduces Turtle Bycatch

Scientists Ricardo Sagarminaga van Buiten (Spanish Cetacean Society) and Ana Cañadas (Alnitak and University Autónoma of Madrid) spent 30 days working with local fisherman onboard a longline fishing vessel, where they conducted 15 experiments using a normal long line with forty baited hooks. When the fisherman substituted their traditional squid bait for mackerel and fished the hooks slightly deeper, the results revealed a significant reduction in turtle bycatch numbers, while the target swordfish catch remained the same.

"We are very pleased with the result of this experiment," says Sagarminaga, president of the Spanish Cetacean Society {Sociedad Española de Cetáceos- site in Spanish} and co-principal investigator of Earthwatch's Spanish Dolphins project. "Perhaps the most positive outcome is the interest we have received from local fishermen who are now willing to cooperate with us to find scientific solutions to the bycatch crisis."

A recent WaPo chronicles conservation efforts in Mexico: Lending a Hand In Playa Las Tortugas This article is awfully heavy on the human interest, and the tortugueros covered make great use of hand rearing. The eggs are scooped up as soon as they are laid and brooded artificially. This is done elsewhere (see Thailand, above) but is far from universally accepted. Many think it may have unforeseen effects on the young turtles, lessening their chances of successful return. The article is also linked to a tourist promo. Still, there are worse things to do with one's time than protecting the beach. It is worth a read.

The camp is one of 48 official turtle camps in Mexico supported at least in part by the Mexican government; ecology groups patrol another 200 beaches sprinkled around the Pacific coast.
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In addition to collecting eggs and releasing babies, Flores Peregrina visits schools and encourages the children to protect turtles, and in fact all animals.
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"This is primarily an agricultural area, and people are still worried about the basics, like what they are going to eat today," says Flores Peregrina. "They tend to have no loving attachments to animals. A lot of people don't even give names to their own dogs. But we pass on the ideas of patience and caring and the importance of these species. Sometimes in class a child will say, 'My father's a poacher, and I'm going to tell him to stop.' That's how you make change."

Closer to home. Public Outraged at Assault on Sea Turtle Protections

Public comments received by the Pacific Fisheries Management Council about its March 9th final vote to allow drift gillnets, also known as "curtains of death," and longlines back into vast protected areas along the Pacific Coast expresses overwhelming public opposition to industry efforts to gut successful conservation measures that protected critically endangered leatherback sea turtles. By the close of the February 15th public comment period, the Council received comments at a ratio of about 2,200 to 1 not to proceed with the expansion of these two destructive fishing practices that injure and kill large numbers of sea turtles, marine mammals, seabirds and valuable non-target fish. In addition, a unique coalition of ten recreational fishing, animal welfare and marine conservation groups with about 9 million members are working to oppose the measure.

"It's time for the Council and NOAA Fisheries to listen to the public and enforce their mandate to protect the public interest" said Robert Ovetz, Ph.D., Save the Leatherback Campaign Coordinator with the Sea Turtle Restoration Project, "And the public interest is keeping leatherback sea turtles and other marine species from going extinct and prevent overfishing."

The United Nations banned driftnets on the high seas in 1991 and the US has followed with recent closures to large areas in US waters including the time and area closures along the Pacific. Since 2001, areas north of Point Conception to an intersect with the Oregon coast have been closed to drift gillnet fishing from August 15th through November 15th in order to protect endangered leatherback and loggerhead sea turtles. During the past three years of this closure, this fishery, which targets swordfish with drift gillnet gear, has had no recorded takes of leatherback sea turtles. Longline fishing, which is also one of the main threats to leatherback sea turtles, was banned along the US West Coast in 2004.

(Loggerhead Sea Turtle, USACE)

While written comments are no longer being accepted, the meeting where this decision will be made on March 9 (agenda) is open to the public. The Sea-Tac Marriott.

Seattle Marriott Hotel, Sea Tac
3201 S. 176th Street
Seattle, Washington 98188
Phone:  [phone]
or [phone]

Sea Turtle Links
(Kemp's Ridley Sea Turtles hatching, USFWS)

Marine Turtles

Information on Sea Turtles and Threats To Their Survival-Caribbean Conservation Corporation & Sea Turtle Survival League This is a great place to start for anyone curious about the natural history of sea turtles.

Sea Turtle Preservation Society

Tagging of Pacific Pelagic (TOPP) research project

Archie Carr
National Wildlife Refuge in Florida.

The Kemp's Ridley Sea Turtle Recovery Program The most endangered of all. There is some success.