Sea Turtles and Sustainability Through Community

For the past three months, we've been having an amazing adventure in Central America - daily inspired by individuals and communities committing their lives to building sustainability through community. During the last two weeks of our semester program, we are volunteering with an international sea turtle conservation program in a small village called Gandoca on the Caribbean Coast of Costa Rica ten kilometers north of Panama. We are working in the Gandoca Manzanillo National Wildlife Refuge in the beautiful Talamanca region. There is a remarkable story here...

Let's start with the sea turtles. Playa Gandoca is one of the most important sea turtle nesting sites in the South Caribbean Coast of Costa Rica with three nesting species (Leatherback, the most abundant; followed by the Hawksbill and Green sea turtles). Since 1991, the sea turtle conservation program at Gandoca beach has tagged over 2,100 nesting Leatherback female turtles. Females mate every two to three years and can nest as often as 12 times during a reproductive year.

Sea turtles are keystone species (not only an indicator of the overall health of our ocean ecosystems, but a species critical to the balance of marine environments) and they are endangered. Worldwide their population has decreased over 80% in the last ten years due to water pollution, loss of nesting habitat to development and beach erosion, poaching of eggs, drowings caused when caught in fishing nets, and ingestion of plastic bags floating in the ocean - which they confuse for jellyfish - their main food source. The Costa Rica coastal zone once supported populations of sea turtles that numbered in the tens of thousands. In the 17th and 18th centuries, mariners' records document "flotillas" of turtles so dense that net fishing was impossible. Their teeming numbers were a dominant force in the ecology of coral reefs and sea grass meadows and in the economy of local communities. Sea turtles have been exploited for centuries by coastal communites as a source of food; as a base material for cosmetics, jewelry, and art crafts; and, more recently, as a major ecotourism attraction.

The Leatherbacks are truly impressive. These gentle giants can weigh over a ton and lay over 150 eggs in each nest. They nest at night in the black sand just beyond the high tide mark. Part of our volunteer duties at Gandoca is to participate in four hour evening beach patrols. We have two patrol shifts - one from 8 to 12 p.m. and one from 12 to 4 a.m. The ten kilometer beach is divided into three sectors, and each patrol is responsible for patroling one section of beach during their shift. There are three to four members per patrol with an experienced team leader. There is also a six hour egg hatchery shift that rotates around the clock (eggs that have been layed in vulnerable spots on the beach are relocated to the safety of the hatchery). Shifts alternate from day-to-day, so if you have the "grave yard" patrol shift from 12 to 4 a.m. (or the 12 to 6 a.m. hatchery shift), you get an earlier shift the next day/night.

For work projects during the daytime, we build sea turtle nesting cages and learn how to build proper-sized egg chambers in the hatchery to relocate eggs that are layed in precarious locations. (Note: Relocating the eggs has increased hatchery success from 40% on the beach to over 80% in the hatchery). In the afternoons, we clear heavy logs and other debris off the beach, help build new hatchery sites (shoveling a ton of sand during a several hour work session), etc. So, when it comes time for our evening shift, we are pretty tired. During our night patrols, we walk back and fourth single file along a two to three kilometer section of beach looking for nesting female sea turtles. We walk tired and in darkness as lights can scare off the nesting females. But when you come across a 2,000 pound sea turtle at 2 a.m. crawling out of the sea and beginning to build her nest, your exhaustion immediately evaporates in the excitement of being so close to this magnificent endangered creature and knowing that you are playing a vital role in her (and her offspring's) survival.

Once we discover a female nesting, we stealthily approach her from the backside and wait while she digs her egg chamber with her two back flippers - over one meter deep in the sand. Just before she lays her eggs, we position a plastic bag under her tail to collect the batch (takes about 20 minutes for her to lay 130 or more eggs). While one or two people hold the plastic bag, two others gather data on her size, overall physical condition, tag number, etc. and then record the information on the data sheet. Once she starts to lay her eggs, she goes into a

semi-transe state and is oblivious to the work we are doing around her. Once she is done laying her eggs, she fills in the chamber with sand and then returns to the sea. We then relocate the eggs to the closest hatchery. (Note: some eggs that are layed in safe positions are left where she lays them). It's really exciting to be a part of the work to save these beautiful animals from extinction. When I see how one plastic bag eaten by a sea turtle can kill it, I am more determined to use my reusable cloth bags when grocery shopping so I can play a small role in reducing the billions of these bags that discarded annually, some of which end up in places like our oceans. There are so many small things we can all do that, collectively, have such a huge positive impact on our planet.

The sea turtle conservation program at Gandoca has been incredibly successful. In the late l980s, 99% of the eggs layed on this beach were illegally stolen. Last year (2007) only 2% were poached. In addition to helping save an endangered keystone species, we are also learning about a very successful program that gives villagers a tangible reason to conserve sea turtles. Here's the story...

Gandoca is a poor, rural village along the Caribbean Coast. Most families here have struggled to achieve a sustainable income. In the late l980s village residents stole sea turtle eggs and sold them illegally generating $3,000 U.S. dollars per year for the entire community. Association ANAI, a Costa Rican community sustainability organization, approached the community and asked: "What if we help you to conserve sea turtles and you can make a lot more money conserving them than poaching their eggs?" This captured the community's interest! ANAI recognized that they needed to provide a viable economic alternative to poaching sea turtle eggs - an alternative that would be attractive financially to the community. So, ANAI helped the community to develop rustic chalets where volunteers come to Gandoca and pay $17 dollars per day to live with community families, receive three hot meals, and volunteer in the sea turtle conservation program. "If you build it, they will come." And they came! Today, several thousand volunteers come to Gandoca from around the world to help save the turtles. The volunteer's inscription fee goes to supporting the conservation program and the $17/person/day fee goes directly to the families they are staying with. How successful has this model been? As mentioned previously, the village made $3,000 poaching sea turtle eggs over ten years ago. Last year, the village made over $225,000 conserving sea turtles. The villagers today are the biggest supporters of sea turtle conservation.

This volunteer conservation model has been incredibly successful, and it came about through a simple, yet profound recognition that it's about sustainability through community. If we want to effectively protect a resource, we need to find imaginative ways for people to recognize the benefits of doing so... I am so grateful for what I am learning about community sustainability and for what I am learning about what I can do to make a difference!