Rare Leatherback Turtles
Gain Protection in Costa
Rica
As dawn breaks on Playa
Grande, the light
reveals shallow sand
pits where leatherback
sea turtles laid their
eggs the night before.
This Costa Rican beach,
a 2-mile-long
(3.2-kilometre-long)
stretch of sand popular
with surfers, is guarded
around the clock by a
small army of biologists
and volunteers from the
Leatherback Trust, a
nonprofit group working
to save the world's
largest sea turtles from
extinction.
That means ensuring that
every turtle nest on the
beach - which is open to
the public for
recreation -is kept
undisturbed.
"This is the most
important nesting beach
for leatherbacks in the
eastern Pacific," said
Gabriela Blanco, who
heads the trust's
monitoring station.
"If we don't protect the
beach, this population
is going to disappear."
As adults, leatherback
turtles can grow as long
as six-and-a-half feet
(two metres) and weigh
up to 2,000 pounds (900
kilograms).
Ranging further than any
other reptile, they are
found in the Atlantic,
Pacific, and Indian
Oceans as well as in the
Mediterranean Sea.
Recently a leatherback
turtle migrated 12,774
miles (20,558
kilometers) across the
Pacific Ocean - the
longest recorded
migration of any sea
vertebrate.
But the animals are
highly endangered due to
human threats such as
poaching, beach
development, and harmful
fishing practices.
For instance, scientists
estimate that less than
5,000 nesting
leatherbacks exist in
the Pacific Ocean today,
a 95 percent drop from
1980. |
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