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Seaside
Couple Helping Turtles
(AP) — Marc and Rachel Ward
spent an evening in February
watching 78 tiny sea turtles
flap and flop their way toward
the Pacific Ocean in Costa Rica.
You could hold one between two
fingers then, but they will grow
to more than 200 pounds by the
time they return to the beach to
nest a decade later.
The hatch was a rare sight a few
years ago, and it’s a sign of
progress made by the Seaside
couple’s nonprofit organization,
Sea Turtles Forever, which has
made a reputation for guarding
the reptiles in Costa Rica.
“For years people had never seen
a nest hatch, but they’re seeing
them now,” said Marc Ward. “It’s
incredible.”
Sea Turtles Forever began in
2001 with the Wards picking up
trash on beaches in Costa Rica.
The nonprofit has grown to
include habitat restoration,
education and nesting protection
for the threatened reptiles,
which often die after becoming
entangled in nets and lines from
commercial fisheries and from
eating trash and plastic that
litter the water.
And fewer and fewer turtles are
born as poachers steal eggs from
nests before they have a chance
to hatch. That’s the issue that
brought the Wards into the
conservation field.
They saw nearly 100 percent of
the eggs being poached on
beaches in northwest Costa Rica,
where four of five sea turtle
species are endangered, and the
other one is threatened. They
recruited volunteers to help
hide the turtle tracks that give
away the nests.
They’ve also tried to change the
community. Rachel Ward created a
conservation coloring book,
which they handed out to 400
young students in Costa Rica
with crayons and pencils donated
by Cannon Beach and Gearhart
elementary schools.
It’s important to teach the
children about the worldwide
consequences of stealing and
eating the eggs, a traditional
practice among the area’s
families, Marc Ward said.
“What we’re really searching for
in this project is social
change,” he said. By working
with communities and educating
people, “You won’t have to
protect the beach forever,” he
said.
The organization uses local and
international volunteers and a
few paid patrollers to walk the
beach and disguise tracks of the
sea turtles crawling up the
beach to nest and returning to
the ocean.
The conservationists do that
work in the dark to get ahead of
egg-hunters, who like them raw
with lime juice and salt.
Still, there may be a stretch
when no turtles nest, but those
that have been saved will
eventually return to the beach,
Rachel Ward said.
“In 12 to 15 years, we should be
able to see an increase in the
number of turtles returning,”
she said. “And it’s already been
successful. Lots of turtles are
being born that weren’t being
born.”
The Wards don’t receive income
from the organization’s funds
and work through the summer to
earn money to support the
program, although next year,
their financial situation will
be a little less reliable. They
came back from Costa Rica a
month early this season.
Rachel Ward is due to have a
baby any day. “We came home a
little earlier than usual,” Marc
Ward said. “We’re ready to have
our own nest hatch.”
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