May 7, 1984. 95 degrees and no sign of slowing down, the clearing of Jamursba Medi Beach in the Bird s Head Peninsula, Indonesia, reveals a gold sand beach and vast outstretches of turquoise water. The waves quietly lap at the shore and the trees wave their branch arms through the sky. Suddenly, the ground starts stirring rows of leatherback sea turtles come out from the waters and trot up the shore, laying down to rest. The sun shines bright and the sky is clear of a single cloud as the 14,455 leatherback nests cover every visible piece of the Jamursba Medi Beach, the major nesting grounds for leatherback sea turtles in the Pacific Ocean. I chose the animal issue of leatherback sea turtles being in grave danger. Leatherback sea turtles were announced as critically endangered by the IUCN Red List in 1983. Although the sea turtles are now considered Vulnerable, their population is still rapidly decreasing and not nearly enough is being done to save this precious species. I chose this issue because of one family trip to Costa Rica two years ago, which opened my eyes to this problem. I traveled to the Caribbean to see the leatherback turtles with my family, but when we arrived that opportunity had faded; our tour guide explained to us the problems of the quickly depleting leatherback population. That thought stuck with me; the fact that a species that withstood the dinosaurs and 100 millions years of survival might disappear in the next halfcentury. I decided that I too could make a change, however small that was, and so I did. I made it a priority of mine to start raising awareness about the endangerment of leatherbacks, and this essay will be a way of spreading this invaluable message to everyone. Everyone should know how crucial leatherback sea turtles are and always have been to our ecosystem. These sea turtles keep coral reefs and seagrass beds healthy, saving the place that numerous other marine organisms depend on. They also play a key role in the marine food web and promote the moving of nutrients from the ocean to the 1
land. These precious creatures are the Earth s biggest turtle, and leatherbacks span the whole globe. They can weigh up to 2,000 pounds and can dive down deeper than sperm whales. Leatherback sea turtles can also heat their own blood like dinosaurs. However, this reptile has been seriously affected by harmful human activity in the last 30 years. Leatherback turtles face many threats in today s world. Common problems include leatherback eggs being stolen by humans, leatherbacks being hunted down, and losing their habitat because of beach developments. Climate change plays a major role as a big threat to the survival of leatherback sea turtles as the beaches erode and water warms up, often disrupting the natural tendencies of leatherbacks to mate. For example, the gender of a sea turtle is dependent on the temperature of the egg. As waters warm up in the East Coast, the female to male ratio will have an upset and unbalanced difference. Pollution is critically harmful to sea turtles when they mistake plastic floating in the ocean as jellyfish, and often choke and die trying to eat the plastic. Adult leatherbacks are also often killed for food and their body is used to make ancient medicines and other products. Boats often collide and kill sea turtles as well. As a result, the female leatherback population plummeted from 115,000 in the 1980s to 20,000 in 1996, and to even smaller numbers today, almost all because of humans. Although the leatherbacks are suffering a major crisis, projects and plans are undergoing right now to help save them. In 2010, many areas of the West Coast of the United States were labeled as a critical habitat for leatherbacks by the National Marines Fisheries Service. TEDs, or Turtle Exclusion Devices, have also been implemented for sea turtles to escape fishing nets when they are accidentally caught, eliminating the threat of leatherbacks drowning as bycatch. Nesting sites of leatherback sea turtles are now heavily protected in Costa Rica and Mexico. Major areas of leatherback nesting have 2
been designated as National Parks and Conservatory Zones that prevent any harm from being induced to the sea turtles. In countries like Ireland plastic bags have also been taxed, which reduces the use of plastic bags by 90 percent, and therefore 90 percent less bags in the Irish waters. Not only does this have a direct impact, but less plastic means less oil and less oil spills, which are dangerously deadly to sea turtles and all marine life. In Florida, strict rules have been implemented by the Environmental Services Association, and leatherback nests have increased to 641 from 27 in 29 years. The Archie Carr National Wildlife Refuge in Florida has the highest density of sea turtle nests in America. Places like these are saving the leatherback turtles and need to be introduced to other countries like Indonesia, where the Bird s Head Peninsula houses thousands of risk-prone leatherbacks. Many other initiatives and projects have been recently carried out to help grow the leatherback population. Some of these initiatives are SOLO, the Save Our Leatherbacks Operation and the Leatherback Trust, which help with the upkeep of major leatherback nesting sites in the world such as in the Las Baulas National Marine Park. The Great Canadian Shoreline Cleanup is an excellent initiative that keeps the Canadian shores clean so leatherbacks don t suffer from plastics polluting the ocean. I feel very strongly about this issue and have ideas of my own that I will be looking to implement in the future. Firstly, every leatherback is precious, and so they need to be monitored. By placing tracking sensors on every leatherback sea turtle, we will be able to track them, to know where they are and if this location is ideal for them to survive and breed. Tracking the leatherbacks will allow greater knowledge of their potential causes of death which can drastically minimize further upsets from humans in the future and allow us to fix the problem. For example, if many leatherback sea turtles migrate to a certain unmarked spot, conservation zones can be established in these new places to 3
provide the sea turtles with a safe and reliable environment to stay in. Also, leatherbacks should be introduced to more care facilities for them to survive and breed in a safe environment while also being shown to normal citizens of this world for them to understand how important it is for us to keep the leatherback alive. Tourism can be incredibly harmful for sea turtles because they are taken advantage of for more money. Care facilities can replace tourist sites by showing the same leatherback turtles, but in a safe and healthy way. Developed countries should start helping sea turtles in international waters and other less-developed countries where leatherbacks are still commonly poached and killed. As citizens of the world we should be more mindful when littering near beaches, and spread this information to others. When enough people come together to solve a problem, they can attract the country's and world s leaders to do more about these issues. So, what can you start doing to help the leatherbacks right now? them. 1. Stop littering on beaches, because sea turtles can mistake plastic for jellyfish and choke on 2. Don t set beach fires during March to July, the nesting season for leatherbacks, because the heat and light disorients the turtles. out of fear. 3. Don t disturb female leatherbacks that are nesting, because they might abandon their young May 7, 2020. 95 degrees and no sign of slowing down, the clearing of Jamursba Medi Beach in the Bird s Head Peninsula, Indonesia reveals a barren beach and murky water. The ground doesn t stir like it used to. Rows of leatherback sea turtles don t come out from the waters and trot down to the shore, laying down to rest. The sun doesn t shine bright and the sky is covered by a giant grey cloud as 4
a mound of plastic bags covers every visible piece of the Jamursba Medi Beach and the 1,532 leatherback nests are but a speck of what used to be. From the 1980s to 2011, the leatherback population has decreased by 95 percent and it isn t slowing down. The last predator of leatherbacks was the Tyrannosaurus Rex, but who will it be if this doesn t stop? Us. Let s bring back the leatherback before we lose that last 5 percent. 5
Works Cited LEATHERBACK SEA TURTLE. All About Wildlife, 25 Dec. 2017, www.allaboutwildlife.com/leatherback-sea-turtle. Newman, Kate. Sea Turtle Facts. WWF, World Wildlife Foundation, www.worldwildlife.org/species/sea-turtle. Leatherback Sea Turtle (Dermochelys Coriacea). Alaska Department of Fish and Game, The Great State of Alaska, www.adfg.alaska.gov/index.cfm? adfg=specialstatus.fedsummary&species=leatherbackseaturtle. Leatherback Sea Turtles. SeeTurtles, www.seeturtles.org/leatherback-turtles/. Leatherback Turtles. Vancouver Aquarium, www.vanaqua.org/learn/aquafacts/reptiles/leatherback-turtles. Public Affairs Office. Leatherback Sea Turtle (Dermochelys Coriacea). Official Web Page of the U S Fish and Wildlife Service, US Fish & Wildlife Service, Jan. 2015, www.fws.gov/northflorida/seaturtles/turtle%20factsheets/leatherback-sea-turtle.htm. Elliott, Brianna. Photos: Help Save Sea Turtles with These Five Simple Steps. Oceana, 16 June 2014, oceana.org/blog/2014/06/photos-help-save-sea-turtles-with-these-five-simple-steps. Williams, Ted. After Steep Decline, Signs of Hope for World's Sea Turtles. Yale E360, Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies, 9 Dec. 2014, e360.yale.edu/features/after_steep_decline_signs_of_hope_for_worlds_sea_turtles. 6
The Leatherback Trust. The Leatherback Trust, https://leatherback.org/. "Save Our Leatherbacks. Save Our Leatherbacks Operation, http://saveourleatherbacks.org/. The Great Canadian Shoreline Cleanup. The Great Canadian Shoreline Cleanup, https://shorelinecleanup.ca/. 7