Your egg chamber is too small!! |
This week, I had three turtle encounters, one on Anse Corail
and two on Anse Intendance. The
encounter on Anse Corail was a lucky encounter as we came across her nesting
while we were just as we were patrolling the beach. This turtle must have been desperate to lay
her eggs: she dug 4 body pits before she started laying, and her eggs were
overfilling her egg chamber! We had to
relocate 43 of her 168 eggs to keep her from accidently crushing them as she
covered her nest.
The two encounters on Anse Intendance were thrilling. I was the sole turtle researcher who was
available to respond to the turtle call on Tuesday, as the other researchers
were on another beach with a different turtle. A couple of tourists were very
distressed when I raced down to the beach not knowing I was a researcher. I thanked them later for that response; that
is exactly how we want watchers on the beach to respond so that people will
stay away from turtles on a beach.
The very next night, while I was at the hotel and waiting
for guests to arrive for the Manager’s Cocktail hour, a turtle was spotted
coming up the beach. After getting my
Trimble and measuring tape, I went to the beach to try to keep the guests low
to the ground and behind the turtle. The
sight of the turtle and the setting sun over the water had attracted over 25
excited guests! Many of them asked
questions and were shocked to learn that sea turtles lay 150-200 ping-pong ball
sized/shaped eggs in each nest and will nest about 4-5 times during a nesting
season. That’s between 600-1000 eggs in
a season! (This turtle laid 156 that night.)
Nesting Hawksbill turtle |
As the sun went down, most of the watchers went back to
their villas, and I was left just with the stars and a turtle on the
beach. It was an amazing experience.
We had a French journalist named Therry visit MCSS this
week. He writes for a French magazine
called QOA that covers eco-volunteerism, and Therry was interested in
interviewing me and a couple other MCSS volunteers. He asked me about how I heard about MCSS and
what motivated me to volunteer in Seychelles.
I told him that I used MCSS as an example of science research teamed
with ecotourism back when the whale shark monitoring project was working with a
dive center in Mahe to offer encounters with whale sharks to both tourists and
scientists. From there, my interest in
Seychelles grew, and when I learned about the turtle monitoring project, I
jumped at the chance to volunteer. Lynn
and I walked through the wetlands with Therry, and he joined us on the turtle
patrol for the day. The issue that the article will be published in should come
out in early 2016. The magazine is
geared towards French speaking young adults as an effort to get them more
interested in eco-volunteerism abroad.
To be a part of a movement of young people who are traveling and
volunteering is exciting!
Cans & pet bottles pick up!! |
Lastly for this post, for the past 4 weeks, Vanessa and I
have been collecting cans and bottles from around Mahe. Some of the beaches that we monitor on our
turtle patrol were covered when we started collecting, and we’ve found many in
the Intendance wetlands. Collecting them
has cleaned up these areas and kept plastic out of the ocean. Cans and bottles can be redeemed at recycling
centers in Seychelles for 25 cents each.
Looks like our collection will fetch 100 rupees at least! We’ll be turning
them in next week, and I’ll share the final amount we got from them when we
find out.
Our collection ready to be redeemed! |