Nature’s most spectacular sights under threat
INDIA: The scattered carcasses of dead turtles bake on the hot
sand. Scraps of the white shells of turtle eggs surround a hole where
stray dogs have dug up a nest.
Until a decade ago, this beach on India’s east coast used to witness
one of nature’s most spectacular sights — the mass nesting of tens of
thousands of Olive Ridley turtles on a single night.
Not since 1995 has that happened. These days just a handful of
turtles come to the beach at Devi to nest,
A dead olive ridley turtle lies on a beach in Konark town, about 70
km (43 miles) east from the eastern Indian city of Bhubaneswar March
14, 2007. The scattered carcasses of dead turtles bake on the hot
sand. Scraps of the soft white shells of turtle eggs surround a hole
where stray dogs have dug up a lonely nest. Reuters
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and its status as one of three main nesting sites for the Olive
Ridleys in India’s coastal state of Orissa is under threat.
Orissa is one of the few remaining mass nesting sites for the Olive
Ridleys in the world.
But the situation on its other beaches is not much better, with
turtles falling victim to government neglect and rapid industrialisation.
Fewer turtles than normal arrived this year at the nearby beaches of
Gahirmatha, where a marine sanctuary has failed to check illegal fishing
by trawlers, and the construction of a large port nearby presents a
major environmental threat.
No mass nesting has yet been seen on the southern beach of Rushikulya,
and time is running out if that beach is not to witness its third
“no-show” in just over a decade.
At the same time more than 8,000 carcasses have been washed ashore
since November, most caught and drowned in the nets of trawlers fishing
too close to the shore, conservationists say.
“Because of an increase in human activity in the sea and along the
coast, the very survival of Orissa’s sea turtles is at stake,” said
Biswajit Mohanty of the Society of Orissa.
Greenpeace says more than 120,000 turtles have been washed up dead on
Orissa’s shores in the past 12 years, most caught in the nets of
trawlers which the law says should not be there.
Total deaths may have been significantly higher.
The trawlers also scatter the turtles as they gather in offshore
waters to nest, and rampant trawling is thought to be a major reason for
the demise of Devi.
But although turtles enjoy the same level of protection under Indian
law as tigers, Mohanty said there was simply no enforcement or political
will to protect them. A single gill net was found to contain 265 dead
animals a few years ago.
“Boats are seized, nets are seized, but then they are released after
a couple of months,” he said. “Not a single conviction has taken place.”
The forest department may unwittingly have contributed to the demise
of Devi when they planted casuarina trees on the beach in a bid to
protect nearby villages from cyclones. That narrowed the beach and made
much of it unsuitable for nesting.
Natural erosion of the beach at Rushikulya, steepening the incline,
may have discouraged landings this year.
But at Devi, traditional fishermen hate the trawlers every bit as
much as Mohanty.
They say their catch has fallen sharply since trawlers came and is
worth perhaps half what it was five years ago, while more expensive fish
like pomfret and hilsa have all but vanished.
They eagerly show Reuters how easily their flimsy nets rip, showing
they present no danger to the turtles, unlike the multi-fibre nets of
the industrial boats.
“We want the turtles to remain, because wherever there are turtles
there are fish,” said 32-year-old Jagabondhu Behra.
This is evidence, Greenpeace says, that it is not a question of
pitting people against turtles. Some areas like Gahirmatha need to be
protected to allow fish stocks room to recover, but in other areas a
balance can be struck.
In 2004 the Supreme Court recommended that trawlers be kept at least
20 km (12 miles) away from nesting beaches, but traditional fishermen be
allowed closer to shore. The rules, which strike a balance between
conservation and livelihood concerns, are supported by Greenpeace but
ignored by trawlermen.
“There is no reason to subscribe to the defeatist attitude that the
problem cannot be tackled unless either turtles or fishermen are
sacrificed,” said Sanjiv Gopal of Greenpeace.
Challenged on the subject, Orissa Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik said
he was unaware that laws meant to protect turtles were not being
enforced.
Reuters |