The Sad Life of a Turtle

Photo Courtesy: SOS

Do you know the arduous journey a baby turtle has to go through to survive to its adulthood under natural conditions?

I did not, until I met Md Arju, a young marine conservationist and founder and CEO of Save Our Sea (SOS).

Exploring and saving marine lives and also the biodiversity of the Bay of Bengal and the coastal zones of Bangladesh - that's what Arzu along with his dedicated team of volunteers do. The Bay of Bengal Sea Turtle Program, a partnership based initiative designed by SOS, is facilitating locally led in-situ protection of endangered sea turtles in the St Martin's Island. 

“In St Martin's, you will mostly find Olive ridley species of turtles. If you are lucky, you may even see Green sea turtles that come out rarely,” explains Arzu. “Both of them are evaluated as 'vulnerable' and 'endangered' respectively on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.”

What do the members of the SOS do? They spend 24/7 on patrolling in shifts and monitor the nesting activities of baby turtles. They rescue mother turtles and hatchlings from predator attacks. They support the local communities, local government institutions and community based organisations (CBOs) to ensure in-situ nest protection of sea turtles and take part in turtle related research and social surveys.

In short, they save lives of other creatures that inhabit the earth along with us.

The extent of predators' attacks, along with human induced threats, on endangered sea turtles is really disappointing, opines Arzu.

Taking care of baby turtles is a meticulous and sensitive job, as they are more vulnerable to changes and environmental stress than adult turtles. They come on the land for a very short period in their life cycle, for the purpose of nesting – the most vulnerable part of their life. Tiny as a bottle cap, baby turtles cannot retract into their shells like terrestrial tortoises with their premature flippers, and thus struggle to survive against attacks by stray dogs. 99 percent of the baby turtles and hatchlings are killed by dogs in St. Martin's – home to at least 400 stray dogs.  They also regularly attack mother turtles while they nest.

Apart from the predators that are higher in the food chain and climate induced dangers, unsustainable coastal development and human activities along the beaches also pose threats to their survival. The presence of a lot of tourists on the beach, artificial lights of beachfront hotels and restaurants scare the baby turtles away. In this kind of situation, they don't tend to come out of the ocean to lay their eggs. Even if they do, they return to the water without nesting as they feel threatened due to external factors. Besides, deep sea trawling without the use of Turtle Excluder Devices (TED) is also responsible for turtle deaths. Even though TED helps to reduce the numbers of large sea animals, such as turtles, which are caught in shrimp nets, commercial shrimp trawl industries are often reluctant to use TEDs.

You might say that there's nothing much we as individuals can do to stop these killings. But you'd be surprised how a small, seemingly insignificant act can threaten their survival. Bangladeshis have a terrible habit of littering everywhere we go; this is terribly harmful for the wellbeing of turtles. “We often find turtles which consume plastic packets and straws, as they block or infect their stomach or intestine and they end up dying slowly of starvation,” Arzu adds.

Even though SOS has dedicated volunteers who don't want to see the turtles disappear, their capacity allows them to protect only one nesting beach (Golachipa). Also the mortality rate of hatchlings from predated nests is very high.

“There are many NGOs which attempt to save them by adopting 'relocation' strategies, which is not quite effective. Whether hatchlings are male or female depends on the temperature and where they are in the nest; the relocation strategy often abrupt the natural male female ratio,” explains Arzu.  Instead of doing that, we try to develop a better understanding of how they naturally live. While doing so, we try to include the local people who live in areas where sea turtles nests are to help the turtle population recover. While human behaviour and negligence threaten the very existence of turtles, there is also great potential for us to make a positive change, believes the saviour.

“The position of a field assistant is voluntary; our volunteers pay for their own travel, food and accommodation. In exchange, they get to earn a weeklong experience of saving endangered sea turtles along with working closely with local communities for this amazing cause,” he concludes.