Scientists can make brilliant discoveries about the life cycles of elusive animals, such as sea turtles, and Earthwatch volunteers can root for the survival of these threatened species, but the real test of the effectiveness of the Earthwatch model of participant funding lies in the conservation policies and official measures it catalyzes to ensure the turtles' future.
Perhaps the two most tangible outcomes of 25 years of Earthwatch-supported sea turtle research are the designation of two protected areas for nesting leatherbacks. Because of data volunteers collected on the importance of Sandy Point, U.S.V.I., as a leatherback turtle nesting beach, in1984, the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service purchased the 3-kilometer-long beach as a National Wildlife Refuge, the first specifically designated for nesting sea turtles.
"Without the volunteers, we never would have accomplished what we have," said Ralf Boulon, former U.S.V.I. Fish and Wildlife director of the leatherback project on St. Croix. "The early efforts of the project, with Earthwatch assistance, provided the information, justification and motivation for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to purchase Sandy Point. Without that significant event, many of our efforts since then would have been less fruitful." In recognition of those efforts, in 1987, Earthwatch received the Department of the Interior's Conservation Award, its highest honor.
In a similar fashion, Earthwatch teams on Costa Rica's Pacific coast were instrumental in gathering evidence of a major nesting area for the Pacific leatherback and convincing the government in 1995, with a push from then-President Clinton, to declare beaches Parque Nacional Las Baulas (‘the leatherbacks"). Since then, the Costa Rican government has instigated a land expropriation program to protect turtle nesting areas on beach property from the negative impacts of development. This program is now being expanded and formalized in legislation introduced in 2002 that would buffer nesting beaches and ban further development. In the meantime, across the nation, Costa Rica's President has put further beach development on hold. (Costa Rican Law Protects Nesting Leatherback Turtles).
One of the most significant byproducts of the saturation tagging programs that rely on Earthwatch volunteers is that nightly patrols have acted as effective deterrents to poachers. On Las Baulas, that has meant that, where poaching had totally cleaned out this major leatherback nesting site in the late '80s, in the mid-'90s, an estimated 150,000 hatchlings made it to the sea. The same is true for the pioneering work conducted on Sandy Point, where the presence of dedicated field teams eliminated poaching entirely.
As a result of studies of hawksbill turtles on Barbados, community hoteliers are adopting policies to further the turtle's survival. These include dimming or redirecting beach lights during hatching season, replanting beach vegetation and halting grooming of beaches in critical nesting areas. Both these beach initiatives create less compact conditions that boost nesting success and help prevent beach erosion. Throughout the Caribbean, there is growing awareness that garbage on beaches can injure nesting female turtles and, by increasing bacterial and fungal contamination of incubating eggs, reduce hatch success . Garbage also attracts egg and hatchling predators-rats, mongooses, and dogs-and creates physical obstacles both for adults searching for a nesting site and for hatchlings heading seaward. Communities that cater to ecotourists are taking steps to clean up their beaches-for turtles and for business. Barbados now has legislation enforcing a full moratorium on harvesting sea turtles, though there are still many Caribbean nations where the hunt is legal at certain times of the year. The nation also now hosts the Caribbean Marine Turtle Tagging Center and Database, in partnership with the Wider Caribbean Sea Turtle Conservation Network (WIDECAST).
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"The Earthwatch model has been a vital part of our success. The work we do is labor intensive and physically demanding. Our collective careers have received an enormous boost from the success we have enjoyed with the results and findings of the project. The on-going and reliable funding we receive from Earthwatch allows us to plan research years into the future without uncertainty about financial and logistical support. It is unlikely that we would have enjoyed such success in this project without the partnership with Earthwatch."
-Richard Reina, Monash University, Principal Investigator, Costa Rican Sea Turtles
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Since 1999 on the opposite side of the globe in Malaysia, the Earthwatch Institute has been instrumental in providing momentum to ongoing sea turtle conservation programs, in preventing poaching of turtle eggs, and in raising community awareness of the turtles' plight. Conservation officials have used data collected by Earthwatch volunteers to revise and adapt management practices, especially to maximize hatchery production. Coupled with findings from other research organizations, Earthwatch data has helped make the case for expanding the number and size of protected nesting beaches in Malaysia, thus increasing the number of hatchlings released to the sea each year.
In summary," said Donna Dutton, field director for the leatherback project on St. Croix, "We really feel that Earthwatch was a major player in the recovery of the St. Croix leatherback population. Careful tracking of nesting females over the years has proven just how much this population really is increasing (unlike most of the other leatherback populations in the world). "We have been able to show how low-tech methods like all night foot patrols can be extremely effective conservation techniques in spite of hazards-both manmade and natural-to turtles once they leave the nesting beach," said Dutton.
Despite these major successes, there is still much to do, especially in making feeding grounds and migration routes safe for sea turtles. A prime goal is to regulate offshore fishing gear, whether it be Turtle Exclusion Devices (TEDS) for the shrimping industry, or limiting the use of long lines or gillnets. Former President Bill Clinton took a step in the right direction in October of 2000 when he signed the Inter-American Convention for the Protection and Conservation of Sea Turtles. The convention recognizes the extensive migration patterns of these endangered species and promotes international cooperation in their conservation. More recently, the governments of Southeast Asia have signed a similar treaty: The Indian Ocean and Southeast Asian Memorandum of Agreement (MOU) for the Protection and Conservation of Marine Turtles and their Habitats. With continued Earthwatch assistance, turtle projects will make further strides in actually saving these ancient and fascinating reptiles as well as promoting wider public support for their conservation.