Jonathan Willans, Manager, Caño Palma Biological Station

It has been a busy few months here at the station and it is not looking like it is going to be slowing down soon. After a very busy Leatherback Turtle season that saw over 90 nests on our 3 mile stretch of beach, we are getting ready for the onset of the Green Turtle season. It has been rather quiet to date but we are seeing more nests on the beach with each passing week. Currently an average night seem to be producing 2 or 3 nests per night, with some nights having 6 or 7.

We are getting ready for the height of the season when there may be 60 or so nests in a single night. It is nights like these, where you can be out on the beach at night for 8 hours and see 10 turtles, which makes you realize why it is hard for people to think that these creatures are actually endangered. The entire beach can be covered in tracks and the craters left behind where a turtle has nested, but still these turtles are at risk. You can still hear it said by many people in the area when the topic comes up. “There are plenty of turtles. They come here every year. They are not endangered”. This is one reason that the poaching that we are trying to reduce is still a problem.

The past two weeks here have been a sad reminder that poaching is still an issue on our beach. Green turtle eggs are generally preferred to Leatherback eggs and their nests are much easier to poach than that of the Leatherback due to the shallowness of the nest and the large, conspicuous hole on the beach left by a Green. This means that there are more people looking for eggs and more poaching. This has been reflected in a higher than usual poaching rate.

As well as turtle eggs being poached, in the past few weeks there have been 4 known turtles that have been taken off the beach and killed. This includes a critically endangered Hawksbill Turtle, a treasure for poachers due to the value of its carapace, which is used to make jewelry, amongst other things. With no police or guards from Minae, (the ministry of the environment), there is no enforcement of the existing laws that are in place to protect the turtles. So what can be done to help stop this troubling trend? One answer is being as much of a presence as possible on the beach at night, getting to the turtles before the poachers do and making sure that they can get back to sea safely. This requires manpower and volunteers. This job can not be done by one or two people alone. We need many people who care and are passionate about these creatures to help patrol the beach and be a deterrent. Without volunteers, the project is not possible. In September we will need people to come to the station and walk the beach. This time of year is generally the peak of the season and when we are most in need of people to help.

I invite you all to come down here to Caño Palma and help make a difference. To see a turtle emerge timidly from the sea, carefully crawl up the beach dragging its seldom felt weight on the sand below, sculpt an egg chamber with precision, deposit 100 or so golf ball sized eggs into it, then cover its precious content for almost an hour and finally drag her exhausted body back to the sea is something that I wish we could all witness. It is nature at its purest.

I hope that this summer is a fantastic one for everyone and I hope to see you here at Caño Palma in September.

Hasta Pronto,
Jonathan