EcoClub 2: Kids, Turtles and the Race to the Sea

Today we took the kids to Playita for a special Sunday EcoClub. We were planning to excavate three nests, and I thought it would be cool for the kids to see the dead fetuses and the bacteria and fungus inside the unhatched eggs. In fact, the kids got to see so much more!

All three nests erupted with healthy hatchlings as soon as we started digging with our hands.

Excavating the first hawksbill nest by hand.

We began handing the kids baby hawksbills by the handful.

The first baby hawksbill to emerge.

After measuring the first ten hatchlings from each nest, we asked the kids to line up the turtles high on the sandy beach. The kids were eager to plop the baby turtles straight into the water, but we explained how each baby turtle needs to make its own way to the ocean so that in fifty years, when it is ready to make its own nest, it will be able to find this exact beach.

On your mark, get set.... let those turtles GO!

The kids “raced” their turtles and picked favorites, though it was more of a slow-motion struggle than a race. Everyone cheered when a turtle was finally carried away by a high-reaching wave, and moaned when a wave pushed a turtle even farther from the ocean or flipped it onto its back.

It is a long journey for the little turtles. First, they must break out of their eggs and dig through a foot of sand. Normally the turtles hatch at the same time an escape through the collective digging effort, but late-bloomers are often left to die under the weight of the sand.

Once on the surface, the turtles can be dehydrated by the sun or burned to death by the sand. They can be picked off by birds or crabs. They can become disoriented and crawl away from the ocean by mistake. Even when they finally reach the ocean, they are at the mercy or predators and the cold water, and they must find their own food. It's no wonder fewer than 1% of hatchlings make it to sexual maturity.

I got down on my belly in the sand to photograph the journey from this baby turtle's perspective.

From down here, the crashing waves look like tsunamis.

I was a little fretful, trying to keep the kids from stepping on, dropping, or otherwise damaging the little turtles in their excitement. I let one precocious eight-yet-old boy use my camera to photograph the adventure, hoping he would not drop my $400 camera in the waves. Luckily he did not.

A photo taken by a talented (and persistent) EcoClubber.

I hope these kids will remember this afternoon with the baby turtles forever, because it is often a loving memory of nature from childhood that inspires the naturalists and conservationists of the world.

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Turtle Captures

Once a week we capture both green and hawksbill turtles for tagging and monitoring.

To catch green turtles, we hang carnada, or bait, over the side of a boat right here in the harbor. For bait we use fish heads from the morning market. The big, oily forehead of the dorado (common dolphinfish) is the green turtles' favorite.

Arica prepares to go turtling.

A dorado head.

Waiting around for green turtles to show up.

Workers in the water and on the boat haul in a mature green turtle.

To catch hawksbills we have to put in a little more effort. We snorkel along the rocky coast and sandy beaches, and when someone spots a hawksbill, she keeps her eyes underwater while raising her hand in the air. The boat comes over to help out.

This male hawksbill must have weighed hundreds of pounds.

Vanessa and Cory measure a hawksbill while Arica records data on a plastic cutting board.

In both cases, the turtle capture itself is quite a sight. Our turtle-catching extraordinaire, Luis, leaps onto the turtle from the boat, mask and snorkel already on his face. He uses his left hand on the front of the shell, directing the turtle's movement upwards, and his right hand on the back of the shell, pushing the turtle up into the boat. Depending on the size of the turtle, this maneuver can be simple or extremely difficult.

Dean, an Equilibrio Azul worker, demonstrates the turtle-catching hold.

Once the turtle is on board, we move through our steps as efficiently as possible. We cover the turtle's eyes with a wet cloth to keep it calm, and take measurements of the carapace (top shell), plastron (bottom shell), head, and tail.

Amelia measures the plastron length.

We record the GPS coordinates of the capture.

The GPS lives in a waterproof sleeve.

We check for metal ID tags at the base of each back flipper. If we find tags, we record the numbers to keep a log of where the turtle has been. If there are no tags, we sanitize the flipper with alcohol before attaching some. We also take a small DNA skin sample from the neck of new turtles.

If the turtle isn't yet tagged, we add a metal tag to each back flipper.

We photograph both tags and both sides of the turtle's face as a backup identification method.

You can identify an individual by its unique facial markings.

Finally, we take note of damage, illness, or epibiont organisms before scraping any adhering barnacles off the body and head.

This turtle has a barnacle hairdo.

I'm fascinated by the idea that the turtle's shell constitutes an entire ecosystem with substrate, nutrients, climate, bacteria, plants, and animals. Last semester I completed a research project on the epizoic algae of Galápagos green turtles. I compared carapace algae to the algae which grows on intertidal rocks: in both cases, algae alters the habitat and allows other organisms, including animals, to move in. I wanted to find out how carapace algae relates to cleaning fishes, barnacle load, microbiota, and turtle health. During that project, my partner and I also discovered a previously unrecorded green turtle epibiont species, the Galápagos pencil urchin. Suffice it to say I am interested in sea turtle epibiota!

So, I have been intrigued by the various epibionts we have pulled off green and hawksbill turtles during our captures. We found this little crab hiding under the back lip of a green turtle's carapace, and once we discovered a baby octopus lodged under the shell!

An epizoic crab.

It's a common assumption that barnacles are bad for turtles, and that's why we scrape the bothersome crustaceans off the turtles we capture, but I have never found a scientific paper linking turtle health with algae or barnacle load. I would love to see (or write?) a study on the specific effects of barnacle removal.

This morning before we snorkeled for hawksbills, Luis taught me the art of the turtle capture. Alas, we found no turtles today, so I have yet to try out my skills.

A western painted turtle I caught while camping in Washington State.

As a kid, I proudly earned the nickname of "turtle whisperer" for my ability to catch western painted turtles in the lake where my family went camping every 4th of July. Granted, painted turtles are about 1/700th the size of mature sea turtles (a painted turtle weighs around 1 pound, whereas a green turtle can reach 700 pounds), but I still hope to try my hand as a sea-turtle whisperer one of these days.

The Turtle Whisperer.

In response to my dad's comment... Here are a couple modern examples of turtle whispering.

The upside-down turtle we rescued along the Tiputini River.

I was studying abroad at Tiputini Biodiversity Station in the Ecuadorian Amazon. On our last day, the whole class was moving by motorized canoe to catch a flight, but of course we stopped the boat, backed up to shore, and saved this upside-down river turtle from death-by-dehydration. I love Ecuadorian Time.

My first wild Galapagos tortoise friend.

Here I am with a giant Galapagos tortoise. I had seen a several of these huge reptiles in the Galapaguera, or hatchery, but this was my first sighting of a wild one. (She was surrounded by broken glass, plastic, and a tire. And as you can see from our bus in the background, she was right by a parking lot.) But she was a giant tortoise! IN THE WILD! I was more than a little excited.

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Beach Patrol

One of Equilibrio Azul's tasks is to patrol four of the beaches within Machalilla National Park, here on the coast of Ecuador. Every few days a pair of volunteers walks the length of the beach looking for signs of turtle nests. I went on my first patrol to Playa Salango with Barbara.

We were equipped with flip flops, measuring tape, pencil, and my dandy Rite-in-the-Rain notepad.

We found one set of tracks in the sand - they looked kind of of like a tire track from one giant wheel. We crossed them out with an "X" to make sure we wouldn't measure the same nest twice.

Crossed out tire -- I mean turtle -- tracks.

That sandy patch is the nest.

When she's ready to nest, the Mama Turtle swims all the way back to the beach on which she herself hatched. She hawls herself up past the high-tide line and looks around for a suitable nest site. If she doesn't fine one, she heads back to the ocean, but if she finds a spot to her liking, she starts digging through the grass and sand with her clumsy flippers. It takes about an hour for her to dig the chamber, lay the eggs, and refill the hole with sand. Green turtles usually lay fewer than 100 eggs, but hawksbills can lay over 150.

Finding our way back home.

After the patrol, we walked down the coastal highway hoping a passing motorist would take pity and give us a lift home. Eventually one did, after making sure we weren't overly wet or sandy. The panoramic views of the Pacific Ocean and the tropical scrubland hills made for a spectacular ride!

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Stranded in Puerto López

Hey world,

I planned to leave Puerto López for the Galápagos Islands after a day or two. Well, the research permits didn’t work out right away, and my visa never came, and we are all on Ecuadorian Time after all. I integrated myself into Barbara’s turtle volunteering organization, Equilibrio Azul, and I’ve been here helping out with the turtles ever since.

I won’t bore you with the daily trials of life in Puerto López. Instead, I will focus each blog entry on a different aspect of the turtle conservation project. I’ve gotten the opportunity to do some pretty gnarly things, from ripping open dead eggs full of bacteria and fungus, to patrolling a restricted white-sand beach for nesting hawksbills at night, to snorkeling amidst jellyfish in search of tagged green turtles. I’ve also had my share of adventures of the bird-watching, horseback-riding, and scuba-diving variety.

Here is a tantalizing sneak peak at the entries to come:

Bomb scientists using tools to measure turtle tracks in the sand.

 Nest excavations and embryo autopsies.

Shark bycatch at the morning fish market.

Cute children painting the fence blue.

Mud ninjas.

Adolescent blue-footed boobies.

Big hawksbills in little boats.

And much more!

It’s not research in the Galápagos Islands as planned, but there are worse things than being stranded in Puerto López. I have enjoyed living these adventures – I hope you enjoy reading about them!

Yours truly,

Nina

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