Baby Turtle Beach Parade

The guest speaker series in my Persuasion class continued today with a representative from the Archelon (ar-HEY-lawn) Sea Turtle Protection Society of Greece.

Baby turtles on their way to the ocean

For every 1000 baby sea turtles that hatch, only ONE survives. They are killed by natural predators, sure, but many more lose their lives to the selfishness of humans. Greece builds hotels on the habitat beaches where turtles used to come to lay their eggs. Lounge chairs and umbrella posts are often right beside or on top of a nest of eggs in the sand. When the baby turtles hatch, they navigate their way to the ocean by the light of the moon and stars. But the lights of hotels confuse them, and they don't have the strength to make it to the ocean if they start out in the wrong direction.

Swim, baby turtle, swim!

Of those that do make it into the ocean, they die from boat propellers, fishing nets, and from eating garbage thrown into the ocean, especially plastic bags that look to them like delicious jellyfish.

What can we do?

1) Stay off the turtle-nesting beaches at night. It is difficult to see a baby turtle in the dark, many are stepped on accidentally.

2) Boycott Greek hotels that are not designated Turtle Friendly. Special light bulbs exist that are indistinguishable from regular bulbs to human eyes, but are much better for turtle eyes, but many hotels refuse to buy the new bulbs because they're expensive. Other hotels ignore the markings of a sea turtle nest and put their beach chairs and umbrella posts in destructive places. And even more tragically, a few Greek hotels have burned down Archelon turtle rescue camps and slashed their inflatable boats.

3) Do not "help" a baby turtle by picking it up on the beach and walking it to the sea. The turtle trek from the beach nest to the ocean is designed to strengthen its lungs and flippers.

4) Add your financial support to the Archelon organization. Archelon does education in Greek schools, runs a veterinary rescue center, and hosts volunteers in camps on several island beaches. The volunteers mark turtle nest sites, move nests to safer areas of the beach, set up fences around nests, transport turtles who need medical attention, and tag turtles for tracking research.