An insight into turtle movements in the Outer Islands - 02.08.2010
Much to Tony’s surprise she emerged at low tide, extremely unusual for a green turtle given Tony’s 10 years of experience in the field.
The turtle was just beginning to dig a body pit at this point and after about an hour on the beach, she had laid about 200 eggs... Tony, now accompanied by clients from Desroches Resort, was able to tag her, his first turtle on Desroches since beginning work in May this year, before watching her crawl safely back to the sea.
About three weeks later, on July 9, Catherina Freminot, another ICS assistant Conservation Officer based on Alphonse, sighted turtle SCA0951/SCA0952 in the northern lagoon of Alphonse Atoll whilst carrying out a daily turtle and seabird patrol.
The turtle, seen at 08:15, was going back to the sea after a failed nesting attempt, again at low tide, allowing Catherina to “catch” her, read and photograph the two tag numbers before the turtle reached deeper waters.
While green turtles are known to migrate long distances from Seychelles to foraging grounds in the Mozambique Channel, this is an interesting new discovery as it is the first record of inter-island nesting between Desroches and Alphonse.
Alphonse lies about 182km south-west of Desroches and the time between sightings was 25 days, which means that the turtle could have been travelling about 7km per day, if we assume that she did not take time to rest between nesting attempts.
ICS staff will continue to monitor and tag nesting turtles on both islands.
This will enable us to gather further data on the inter-island nesting behaviour and population movements of this endangered species, which will provide a better picture of the turtle activity in the Outer Islands region.
The Island Conservation Society promotes the conservation and restoration of island ecosystems.
by Tony Jupiter and Catherina Freminot
Forrás: http://www.nation.sc/