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Rare Hawksbill turtle to be satellite tagged.

11/08/2007 00:00:00

Hawksbill turtle facts

The Mozambique turtle conservation project is part of the Maluane – Biodiversity and Tourism Project. It was set up in 2002 to ensure the community-based protection of marine turtles and their nests, which were being raided and killed by outside fishermen, and to acquire the relevant scientific information on turtle populations to allow the development of regional management strategies.
Hawksbills in the Indian Ocean are among the top ten turtle conservation priorities.
Trade statistics going back more than 100 years indicate massive declines of up to 95 per cent in hawksbill populations, specifically in Madagascar, Seychelles and Sri Lanka.
There is a historic international trade in hawksbill shell, especially between the mid 1960s and early 1990s, which greatly reduced the sizes of hawksbill populations.
Coastal development of nesting beaches poses an increasing threat to nesting populations.

The Zoological Society of London is about to start pioneering work to monitor a hawksbill turtle with a state of the art satellite tag. It will reveal the migratory path of a turtle the first time as it is followed across the ocean. You can follow the path on the ZSL website (www.zsl.org) once the tag is in place.

ZSL’s marine turtle project has monitored and protected turtles in isolated parts of northern Mozambique for 3 years. Careful observation and regular patrols of nesting turtles has virtually stopped the poaching of eggs in the study area. Over 385 green and hawksbill turtle nests have been recorded, protected and monitored by the local Mozambican team working on behalf of ZSL. Within the study area, 87% of nests were found to belong to green turtles and the remaining 50 nests to hawksbills. This shows how important the beaches are for hawksbills as no other beaches in East Africa are known to have such high numbers.

Hopefully the tag will be in place by the end of 2006 and Alison Shaw, ZSL’s Aquatic Conservation Manager, said: ‘We hope the satellite tag will enable us to track the turtles as they migrate across the Indian Ocean.

‘By knowing their patterns of movement, we will be able to better safeguard them and make sure that they return to our beaches to nest again.’

Research has revealed that the turtles return to the same beach to lay eggs up to 8 times in a season, picking nesting sites very close to their previous nests. With the eradication of poaching, hatching success rates shot up with more than 70% of the hatchlings making it to the sea. It is also hoped that genetic sampling will allow useful analysis to identify the relationships between turtle populations and potential migratory routes.

Alison Shaw added: ‘The surveys allow the development of the regional management strategy for the protection of these endangered species.

‘The project has also demonstrated the importance and success of training and employing local monitors and the transfer of skills for turtle conservation and research to Mozambique.’

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