Celebrating 25 Years of Action for Biodiversity

Hawksbills play a key environmental role by eating sponges which helps keep coral reefs healthy [ ] 49 The island where endangered Hawksbill turtles thrive The last three decades have seen almost 450 hawksbills tagged for monitoring purposes and, over that period, the number of those nesting there has increased three-fold. Every turtle laying eggs on the island’s Pasture Beach is identified thanks to meticulous hourly patrols by re- searchers and volunteers every night for the duration of the five-and-a- half-month annual nesting season. Dr. Seth Stapleton of the University of Minnesota who is overseeing the work, said 2014 had been a record year with nearly 90 hawksbills spot- ted.“When the project started there were about 30 individuals nesting per season. What’s even more remarkable is that we are continuing to see some of the same turtles that were first tagged in the late 1980s returning to nest here. They were originally tagged when they were probably 15 to 20 years old, and a few are still repro- ducing decades later.” Long hunted for their beautiful brown and gold shells — used to make everything from sunglasses to jewellery — the population of hawksbills worldwide has declined by 80 per cent in the last 200 years. They have been listed as critically endan- gered since 1996. Although the trade is now banned, they still face horrendous odds with only one in 1,000 hatchlings making it to adulthood due to omnipresent marine predators. Exacerbating matters further is hawksbills’ late maturation; they do not usually begin to reproduce until they are at least 15 years old. Dr. Stapleton said that the Jumby Bay study had been integral to providing fundamental information about hawksbills. “Many details we now take for granted were learned there. For ex- ample, that they don’t nest every year; they nest four or five times in one year, laying around 150 eggs each time and then skip a year or two,” he explained. “But there’s still so much we don’t know, such as how long they live. My ballpark guess would be 50 to 60.” Because turtles are tagged when in their so-called ‘nesting trance’ — a daze-like state during the egg-laying process when they are oblivious to their surroundings and unable to move quickly — most of the data gathered is about adult females. Researchers are now taking genetic tissue from the hatchlings to compile information about the males, too. Plans for the upcoming year also include deploying three satellite transmitters to track hawksbills’ movements by GPS. Ashton Williams, of Antigua’s Environmental Awareness Group has remarked that a small number of turtles were still poached for their meat on the mainland. But Donna Cook, the resort’s spokeswoman, has pointed out that: “The island is one of the few places on earth where turtles are completely safe.” Hawksbill turtle, found in tropical waters around the world Antigua and Barbuda T he private Caribbean island of Jumby Bay off the north coast of Antigua and Barbuda is the site of the world’s longest running research programme for critically endangered hawksbill turtles. Next year will mark the 30th anniversary of the study, funded entirely by Jumby Bay’s homeowners. It has collated more data on this species of turtle than any other project, and the area is now one of the few places in the world where their numbers are increasing. Tom Fisk